OccupyGhana, a social and political non-partisan pressure group, has intimated that the executive pushback in the anti-corruption assessment report leading to the resignation of the Special Prosecutor is to be expected in all constitutional and statutory independent bodies.
The pressure group, however insisted that, the OSP maintaining his independence regardless of the Executive’s push is vital.
“Having perused Mr. Martin Amidu’s letter, we believe that the main challenge had to do with his interaction with the Executive on his most recent corruption risk assessment report. Without commenting on the merits or otherwise of the matters in disagreement, we believe that Executive pushback is to be expected in the work on all constitutional or statutory independent bodies.
“When it becomes an attempt to creep on turf, we believe the best option is to call the bluff of the Executive, assert independence, stick to one’s guns and proceed with one’s mandate. If we do not do this then we have surrendered that precious independence, back to the Executive”.
Justifying the decision made by the SP, Occupy Ghana maintained that, “while the Constitution or statute may give complete independence from the government, we expect that the persons appointed to those offices would also assert that independence whenever it is challenged”.
“Without that, the legal provisions that grant independence would be meaningless, the offices would be surrendered to government control, and Ghana would be the ultimate loser for it”.
OccupyGhana further restated its support for the OSP and its independence “from every other person or authority”.
“The purpose behind all of these independent institutions under the law is to preclude the exercise of arbitrary power. We expect there to be friction. Inherent in that inevitable friction is the expectation that each officeholder would hold their ground so that in the healthy equilibrium of tension, Ghanaians would be protected from an undue governmental authority.
The pressure group further expressed its disappointment “in both the resignation and its subsequent acceptance, which make it impossible for the decisions to be rescinded”.
Meanwhile, a statement released from the Presidency on Tuesday evening in response to Martin Amidu’s resignation letter indicated that, the former prosecutor was at no point in his meeting with the president asked to halt his inquiries into the deal to enable the President to “handle the matter”.
“At no point did the President ask you to shelve the report, so he could handle the matter. It is difficult to see in what way and in what context the President would seek to handle the matter when the matter was already public knowledge and had led to the Ministry of Finance suspending action on the Agyapa transaction in anticipation of your report”.
The statement further revealed that, “the President had accepted the observations” made by the former Special prosecutor “in the Agyapa Report and had acted on it by issuing directives to officials of the Ministry of Finance and the Attorney-General’s Department”.
“This cannot be the conduct of a person seeking to hamstring your efforts or to avoid the contents of the Report”.
