GOC President to continue law suit against Frank Appiah
President of the Ghana Olympic Committee, Professor Francis Dodoo, has indicated that he will continue with his GH¢200, 000 law suit against former GOC 1st Vice President Frank Appiah for defamation.
The three time Olympian lodged the suit in January, 2011 after Mr. Appiah accused him of having used banned doping substances in the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, during a radio discussion on Accra-based station, Radio Gold in December, 2010.
With the new legal season re-opened, the case is slated to be called again.
Earlier in an interview with ghanabusinessnew.com, the solicitor for Francis Dodoo, Mr. Kissi Agyebeng, insisted that Frank Appiah was given ample opportunity to retract the statement by the programme host, but Mr. Appiah instead persisted with his claims.
Speaking on eTV’s “Revealed” Tuesday November 22, the newly elected GOC President Francis Dodoo, said he was intent on clearing his name saying he will pursue the case against Mr. Appiah.
“Fortunately, Frank and I will be in court. He will have the chance to explain these things that he recklessly put out in the public domain,” he said, adding, “I have never ever taken any banned substance. I have never tested positive. I have never run away from a drugs test.
“Fortunately, now I have the records from the International Association of Athletics Association. Frank Appiah went out and accused me of such, we wrote to the IAAF; those records have come after a series of email exchanges”
It will be recalled that then GOC 1st Vice President Frank Appiah, attempted to make a U-turn on his earlier claims when he told Accra-based radio station, Citi FM, that he only suspected that Prof. Dodoo was lucky to have escaped a ban during the 1988 Seoul Olympics after allegedly training with the coach of disgraced American Sprinter Ben Johnson.
Dodoo admits that the drugs usage claim hurt him personally.
“You are sitting at home and your children come and ask you: “daddy is it true you were taking steroids when you were an athlete?” And you imagine what they must have heard in school to make them come and ask you that question.
“And why? Because some person somewhere decides to throw a lie out into the public domain. It is unfortunate but I personally can handle it but when you think about the other people, and particularly family members, who get affected by this, it is unfortunate,” he said.
Prof. Dodoo faced intense negative publicity in some particular media in the immediate period preceding the October 29, 2011 Ghana Olympic Committee elections.
By Erasmus Kwaw