The office of Nimba County’s district #4 Representative, Gonpue L. Kargon, has refuted media report linking him to alleged money laundering and counterfeiting in the country.
According to a release from the office of the representative, the story reported by the Independent Probe newspaper is fake and misleading, and only intended to tarnish the hard-earned reputation of the lawmaker.
“The lawmaker’s office wants to make it emphatically clear that the paper kept the public in doubt when it stated that ‘Sources tell IPNEWS that indeed the Representative travelled to Dubai in mid-September 2022 for undisclosed reasons’,” the lawmaker’s office said in a press release.
The office said another unrealistic and fake statement in the publication is the issue of the alleged leak audio, as quoted below, which the paper claimed it intercepted.
“According to a leaked audio intercepted by the authoritative Independent Probe newspaper (IPNEWS), an accomplice named Thomas Kollie, currently living in Dubai, narrates how Representative Kargon has procured four containers of the counterfeit money and has dispatched them to Liberia for use on the parallel market.”
The publication further stated, “In the leaked audio, Kollie encouraged a man (name withheld) and several persons to travel to Dubai for counterfeit Liberian dollars.”
Interestingly, when Thomas Kollie was arrested by the Liberia National Police (LNP), investigated and turned over to the court for prosecution, he did not mention the name of Representative Kargon anywhere during the investigation, neither did he inform the police about having any connection with the representative.
“We wonder how the paper understood the language of “accomplice” and “link”.
Meanwhile, The LNP charged sheet, in the possession of the Hot Pepper, disclosed, “On October 12 2022 Defendant Thomas Kollie, resident of 24th Street, Sinkor, Monrovia, was arrested by officers of the Liberia Revenue Authority (LRA) upon arrival at the Roberts International Airport via ASKY Airlines from Dubai in possession of twenty-nine thousand Liberian dollars counterfeit Bank notes (L$29,000.00) as tested and proven by the Central Bank of Liberia (CBL) to be Liberian dollar counterfeit banknotes before being turned over to the police for criminal investigation.”
The LNP report further said, “Consequent of his complicity of being in possession of the above mentioned Liberian dollar counterfeit banknotes (L$29,000.00), he was informed of his Constitutional rights, investigate and duly charged with the commission of the crimes money laundering, counterfeiting/forgery and criminal conspiracy in violation of Chapter sections 15.70 and 10.3 of the Revised Panel Law of the Republic of Liberia and forwarded to court for prosecution.”