In the wake of fraud allegations against Tarek Awayda, a Lebanese who is the Director of collapsed OFCOM Technologies, for swindling a Ghanaian businessman, one Leo, $30,000 under the guise of installing an elevator in his house, the former in a rejoinder has refuted the allegations, saying he has not committed fraud because he did not personally receive the money.
In a letter signed by his lawyer, Biadele Mortey Akpadzi, from Deleric Law Consult, Tarek Awayda was contracted to install a lift in a 3-storey building ,”our client says that his company undertook several visits to the site of the construction for all necessary engineering surveys, and having concluded agreement with the said client, he delivered mechanical parts and equipments of the lift to the site”
‘’Our client says in spite of the promises of the said client to complete the project, so that the final installation of the lift may be undertaken, his company has not been afforded the opportunity to undertake the lift, and therefore the parts and the equipments of the lift has been left at the construction site for 5 years and have been battered by the elements of the weather and some of them destroyed as a consequence”, he added.
“Our client says he has not signed any personal contract with anyone, he has not signed any personal contract with anybody to undertake the installation of elevators , and that he is a genuine businessman who has been out of Ghana for genuine reasons whatsoever to be on the run “, he said.
Another part of the letter also reads in part, that “the publication is intended to create, and has actually created a very bad image of him personally in the eyes of his business partners, colleagues and the whole world and demands appropriate apology “.
However, interestingly, we have intercepted series of conversation between the businessman and Tarek Awayda, which suggested that in the last five (5) years, he has been making several promises to make refunds , but never fulfilled any of the promises.
We noticed from the numerous conversations that he had severally requested account details of the businessman to make the refunds since 2019, but never made any payment.
Recounting his ordeal, the Ghanaian businessman, Leo explained that “these are some of our chats and since 2019, he promised to refund the money and also promised severally to meet me in my office, l haven’t set an eye on Tarek. And apart from WhatsApp you can’t get him on phone, if he is not a fraudulent person, what is he?”, he questioned.
“Also if their letter says the parts are in the construction site, how again would he say he has no contract with me, that is a contradiction”
“The truth is that, he has never brought any lift parts to the site. When he claimed the lift parts were at the Port, l asked him to bring them to the site, but he never brought anything, i never saw them and haven’t seen him since then”, Mr. Leo fumed.
