Contrary to some held perception that the Member of Parliament for Assin Central made his wealth on the back of drugs, Kennedy Akompreko Agyapong says he has never peddled drugs not to talk of making money from it.
According to him, the source of his wealth which many people struggle to fathom is as a result of his active work in the 1980s processing amnesty documents for undocumented immigrants in the US.
Speaking on Citi TV’s lifestyle variety show, Upside Down, Kennedy Agyapong said together with his boss at the time, Kwadwo Afram Asiedu, they processed 2,500 applications for $2,500 each.
“In 1989, [US President] Ronald Reagan had introduced an amnesty program so I was fortunate to work with a lawyer. He is called Kwadwo Afram Asiedu. He recruited me and I started working with him. That is the cocaine money. That is where I made the money. I made a lot of money. We did about 2,500 applications and everybody paid $2,500. I did all the documentation and my boss, because he is a lawyer, will go and present the documents at the immigration [office]. Out of the $2,500, my boss will get $700 and I will get the rest and use some for the documentation. So when we finished, I had made a lot of money,” he said.
He continued that after returning to Ghana, he took advantage of the US Visa Lottery program that was newly introduced at the time to process documents for interested Ghanaians wishing to travel to the US.
Facilitating each documentation for $5,000, the outspoken member of the governing New Patriotic Party said, by the end of the program that year, he had made over $1 million including his personal savings.
“When people don’t know your background and they think that you are a drug dealer, it is so painful. To the second chance of my money… A lot of Ghanaians had won the US lottery and they didn’t know how to process it so I went back to America and this time another boss, Lawyer Fofie, I went there and told him that I have a connection in Ghana…He was interested in the cash right there. He took $500…I bought the applications for $48,000, that’s about 96 applications and brought it to Ghana.”
“That is another ‘cocaine’. At that time, I was charging $5,000 each. And in 1996, September 30, that was the last day of the US lottery, after that program, I checked my account, what I have saved and I had $1,145,000. I felt so good.”
Kennedy Agyapong said he has always told himself that he will be a millionaire by age 40.
“I always said to myself that I am going to be a millionaire by age 40. I didn’t know how I was going to make it but I was working,” the legislator said.
About Upside Down
The ‘Upside Down’ show is a lifestyle variety show that seeks to entertain families and viewers with inspiring and compelling conversations.
It airs every Sunday on Citi TV at 7pm and repeats at 4pm on Monday as well as 2pm on Fridays.
Upside Down is hosted by Frema Adunyame and Ato Kwamina Essuman.
