By Nadia Ntiamoah
Deputy Chief of Staff In Charge of Operations at the Presidency Stan Xoese Dogbe has pushed back against a report linking Ghana to a major cocaine seizure in the Netherlands, accusing a media outlet and political actors of recycling an old incident and presenting it as a new development.
Dogbe, in a statement published on his facebook page, described the $500million cocaine report as another example of what he called misinformation and disinformation, arguing that the issue being reported had already occurred in June 2025.
According to Dogbe, the cocaine-related arrests followed a tip-off from Ghanaian authorities to their counterparts in the Netherlands concerning a container arriving from Ghana. He further claimed that Ghanaian suspects connected to the case were already before the courts in Ghana.
He questioned why, in his view, a media organisation would continue to publish what he described as false information and present it as news.
He also linked the controversy to Ghana’s recent political history, arguing that misinformation and disinformation contributed to the downfall of the Akufo-Addo administration and negatively affected the 2024 campaign of then-NPP presidential candidate Dr Mahamudu Bawumia.
His comments, however, have triggered a public pushback, with critics questioning the basis of his claim that Ghanaian authorities tipped off Dutch investigators.
At the centre of the dispute is a June 13, 2025 cocaine seizure in Amsterdam involving approximately 4,500 kilogrammes of cocaine concealed in a timber shipment originating from Ghana.
Dutch authorities have publicly confirmed the seizure, which was reportedly made at the Port of Amsterdam. The shipment was described as originating from a Ghanaian company and being destined for a company in Germany.
The scale of the seizure made the case particularly significant. Approximately 4.5 tonnes of cocaine would amount to about 90 standard 50-kilogramme bags, illustrating the enormous quantity of narcotics involved.
Reports on the case have also indicated that the shipment was valued at more than €112 million at wholesale prices, with its potential street value estimated at hundreds of millions of dollars. The seizure has been described as the largest cocaine interception recorded at Amsterdam’s port at the time.
The central disagreement, however, is not about whether the cocaine was seized. Dutch authorities have confirmed that. Rather, the dispute concerns how Dutch authorities identified the container for inspection and whether Ghanaian authorities provided advance intelligence that led to the seizure.
Dogbe maintains that Ghanaian authorities tipped off their Dutch counterparts about the incoming container.
Critics challenging his statement have asked him to produce the official Dutch record supporting that claim.
According to the Dutch Public Prosecution Service’s publicly reported account of the June 13 operation, the container was selected for further inspection following a risk analysis. The shipment was subsequently subjected to additional checks involving scanners, sniffer dogs and customs officers, leading to the discovery of the cocaine concealed within the timber.
The published Dutch account, critics point out, does not establish in that description that the container was selected following a specific tip-off from Ghanaian security authorities.
That distinction has become the main issue in the public exchange.
Dogbe’s critics argue that describing the report as completely false because the incident occurred in 2025 overlooks the fact that the underlying cocaine seizure itself is genuine and involved a Ghana-linked timber shipment.
They contend that the age of the incident and the accuracy of the reporting about it are two separate questions.
If the report was presented as a new seizure in September 2026 when the actual seizure occurred in June 2025, that would concern the date and framing of the report. But the cocaine seizure, the Ghanaian origin of the timber and the quantity of drugs involved remain separate factual questions requiring documentary evidence.
Questions have also been raised about the Ghanaian end of the shipment.
If a Ghanaian company exported the timber in which the cocaine was concealed, investigators would ordinarily be expected to establish the identity of the exporter, the circumstances surrounding the preparation and loading of the cargo, the parties involved in the transaction and whether the exporter was knowingly involved.
Dogbe has stated that Ghanaian suspects connected to the case are before the courts in Ghana, but critics have questioned why the Ghanaian public was not given clearer information about those proceedings if the arrests were directly connected to the Amsterdam seizure.
His critics, however, maintain that the date of the seizure does not invalidate the questions raised about the shipment. They are particularly challenging his assertion that Ghanaian authorities initiated the Dutch interception through a tip-off.
The Dutch Public Prosecution Service’s account, as cited in the dispute, states that the container was selected for further inspection based on a risk analysis before scanners, sniffer dogs and customs officers were deployed.
