The National Blood Service (NBS) has refuted claims that the owner of the Despite Group of Companies, Osei Kwame Despite, has been using blood donated for rituals.
A Youtube page published a video in which a man named Evangelist Emmanuel Addai alleged that blood accrued by the Despite Group’s organised blood donation exercise is used for rituals by its owner.
The National Blood Service has however come out to state that “these assertions by the said Evangelist Addai on the recordings are palpably false, baseless and most regrettable.”
“We wish to state with no equivocation that no staff of Despite Group of Companies was involved in the technical process of that blood donation exercise… The entire blood donation exercise was successfully managed by a joint team of dedicated health professionals drawn from the Southern Zonal Blood Centre, 37 Military Hospital, Police Hospital and Cape Coast Teaching Hospital,” a statement signed by the CEO of the service, Dr. Justina K. Ansah, said.
The NBS went further to dissociate itself from the comments of the evangelist and asked Ghanaians to ignore same.
“It is our firm belief that these recordings are only meant to tarnish the hard-won reputation of Osei Kwame Despite and also to create public disaffection for such community blood drives…”
“We wish to assure the general public of our commitment to blood safety, adequacy and ethical conduct at all times.”
Despite Group of Companies mass blood donation exercise records 1,659 units of blood
On July 3 2017, the National Blood Service published on its website that the blood donation exercise that was organized by the Despite Group of Companies recorded 1,659 units of blood and 7,000 participants.
According to that statement, the team could have done better, considering the number of people who were unable to donate, and added that the Despite Group was considering doing it twice every year.
This particular edition of the exercise was held at the Police Training School in Accra.
Evangelist Emmanuel Addai accuses Osei Kwame Despite of blood rituals
The self-acclaimed Evangelist Addai in the said video, alleged that Osei Kwame Despite has been diverting blood that is accrued from the donation exercise that was organized by his company for rituals.
According to him, instead of the blood being used to help those in need of blood, it is used for rituals that are used to sustain Despite’s vast wealth.
He also accused the businessman of being a 33rd degree Freemason. Not much details could be found on the self-acclaimed evangelist, and it is unclear whether Kwame Despite would be considering suing him for defamation.
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By: Jeffrey Owuraku Sarpong/citinewsroom.com/Ghana
