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Liberia newsPolitics News

Martin Kollah admits: “I received salaries after my resignation”

By Lincoln G. Peters

Montserrado County Senator Abraham Darius Dillon’s former Chief of Office Staff Mr. Martin Kollah has admitted that he received salaries deposited in his accounts with a combined total of USD$3,942.00 for five months covering September 2021 to January 2022, despite resigning from the position which gave him such salaries.

Addressing a major press Conference Monday, 7 February 2022, Mr. Martin explained that a portion of these funds was electronically transferred by the United Bank for Africa (UBA) to the Liberia Bank for Development and Investment (LBDI) to service his mortgage loan.

But Mr. Kollah informed reporters at the press conference that he has restituted the monies deposited into his accounts.

“As such, attached to this communication is a check #00045715 in the amount of USD$3,942.00 which covers full restitution of the amount balance in my account and transfer from these accounts to date,” he said.

“Finally, I also accept that I held a responsibility to ensure that the salary bank account at the UBA was closed, as they were in my name,” Mr. Kollah said.

Having realized that he bears responsibility for the salaries transferred into his accounts, Mr. Kollah told reporters that he was restituting to the Office of the Comptroller of the Liberian Senate the amounts used to service his mortgage loan.

Further, he indicated that he now asked that the accounts be closed effective immediately and that his name is removed from the payroll in order to avoid any future occurrence of this situation.

According to Mr. Kolleh, as a result of his resignation from Senator Dillon’s office, he met with loan officers from LBDI, the holders of his mortgage loan, informing them of his resignation and tried to reschedule his loan.

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He further indicated that he was informed by his loan officers that the loan rescheduling could not be done because the Central Bank of Liberia had placed a moratorium on all loans rescheduling by LBDI.

Martin explained that his unemployment could not permit him to pay his loan.

“On November 9, 2021, LBDI representative Mr. Victor Momolu and team met with me and confirmed that my loan was in default and reminded me that I needed to make payment to bring my loan current,” he narrated.

 “I informed the bank representative that I was expecting funds soon from a project I was working on and would remit the outstanding balance when I receive the funds,” Martin continued.

 However, he said he was with the understanding that no salary payments were being deposited to his UBA salary account until he received the letter from Senator Dillon’s administrative assistant, Mr. Kangbah, that he (Martin) had been illegally receiving salaries from the Liberian Senate.

The bank statement shows that although salary payments were made into his accounts towards his mortgage loan, Mr. Kollah argued that the accounts were never serviced for three months after his resignation.

 The bank statement said on 30 August 2021, Mr. Kollah received US$620.29 and LR$26,511.00.

Also on 4 October 2021, it says his accounts received US$ 620.33 and LRD$26,487.93 while on 5 November 2021, USD$621.65 was deposited into his account, followed by another deposit on 8 November 2021 of LRD$14,617.69.

Kollah said this is evidence that LBDI stopped deducting monies from his account for three months after he informed them that he was no longer in Senator Dillon’s employ.

He claimed that despite LBDI not servicing his loan for three months and the bank’s loan officer informing him that his loan was in default, miraculously on 17 November 2021, UBA allegedly began electronically transferring to LBDI account to service his mortgage loan payment.

“On November 17 USD$600 was transferred to my account three times. The same day, LRD$24,000 was also transferred to my account three times, November 8, 2021, LRD$ 14,617.69 was also transferred,” he said.

Meanwhile, inventing his anger, Mr. Kollah has decided to go into a fight against his former boss, Mr. Dillon, whose office has flagged the transfer of salaries into Kollah’s accounts after resignation, warning that everything Mr. Dillon did in the dark will surely come to the light in due time.

“It’s clear to me that your failure to remove me from the payroll was not a simple lapse in performing your requisite administrative function but rather done with [sinister] motive that you would be able to use against me in the future,” Mr. Kollah told Mr. Dillon.

 “However, rest assured Senator Dillon, that just as you have shown your true colors in this and several other actions, I am convinced you will continue to do so because it’s innate. However, everything that you have done in the dark will surely come to the light in due time,” Mr. Kollah warned Mr. Dillon.

He alleged that Mr. Dillon sought to entrap him by not removing him from the payroll, alleging that the entire saga was a sinister plot concocted and carried out by the Senator from the very beginning to incriminate him (Martin).

He accused Dillon of allegedly harboring ill feelings towards him as a result of the negative public and media backlash the Senator received after his resignation and his political stance in the Liberty Party.

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The New Dawn is Liberia’s Truly Independent Newspaper Published by Searchlight Communications Inc. Established on November 16, 2009, with its first hard copy publication on January 22, 2010. The office is located on UN Drive in Monrovia Liberia. The New Dawn is bilingual (both English & French).
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