Leave Judges Alone. Atta Akyea Tells Mills

Lawyer Samuel Atta Akyea, the Member of Parliament (MP) for Akim Abuakwa South, has taken strong exception to what he described as President Atta Mills’ subtle attack on the country’s judiciary, advising the Chief Executive of the land not to malign judges as a result of government’s streak of losses in court.

The Mills administration, according to him, lost cases because it sent politically contrived packages to court with ill-motive to jail political opponents, stressing that the losses were symptomatic of “garbage in and garbage out.”

Presenting his fourth State of the Nation address, President Mills subtly attacked judges because of his administration’s inability to win cases in court, stating that there was perception that the Judiciary was on the side of wrongdoers.

However, contributing to the on-going debate on the address, Mr. Atta Akyea strongly disagreed with the first gentleman of the land, arguing there was the principle of “garbage in and garbage out. If you package a political case which is masquerading as a criminal case and the judges don’t give you what you have, it is your own packaging. You don’t blame the Judiciary as being in the side of wrongdoers.”

He slammed the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) for reducing issues of governance, including justice and rule of law to propaganda.

“Mr. Speaker, you’ve heard about this jamboree talk, we would jail them, we would jail them but the unfortunate aspect of this is that the powers to jail are not vested in any political party. The power to jail is vested in the Judiciary,” Mr. Atta Akyea said in obvious reference to Betty Mould-Iddrisu, former Attorney-General and Minister for Justice who reportedly declared in Kumasi that she was going to jail former ministers under the Kufuor-led New Patriotic Party (NPP) administration.

He warned that it would be dangerous to believe that the Judiciary was an extension of NDC or NPP, pointing out that the Judiciary was the bastion of the country’s democracy, which must not be undermined.

Quoting Amos 5:7, Hon Atta Akyea reminded the president “that let justice run down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

Justice, he stressed, “should be let free to run and that when it comes to justice, we should not bring our political lenses to bear on issues. Judges are independent and they should be insulated from politics.”

President Mills cited the failed case of Ghana@ 50 celebrations in which his administration sought to prosecute former officials under the Kufuor administration, to cast insinuations at the Judiciary.

“In many of these matters that reflect negatively on governance, the Judiciary is the institution of state with the mandate to dispense justice and the Executive with the mandate to implement the law, must act as partners engaged in a collective effort to rid the country of corruption, drugs and other harmful activities.

“Any perception that the Judiciary is on the side of wrongdoers undermine democracy and the institutions of democracy. Whilst urging our Honourable Justices to live up to their noble calling of independent arbiters, I will like to remind them that they are an arm of government in riding the society of criminal elements, thereby ensuring justice for the citizenry and other persons”, President Mills insinuated during his State of the Nation address.

However, Mr. Atta Akyea said, “There is no perception in this country with respect that the judiciary is on the side of wrongdoers. It is with respect to say that if there is any perception that the Judiciary is on the side of wrongdoers, it is an NDC perception and not a Ghanaian perception.

“Some people have decided that anything which does not go well with them, so far as the packaging is from the Attorney-General and they do not succeed, that means the Judiciary is not on their side. That is a dangerous path for us to trek. People go to court and they lose cases and when they lose cases they have the benefit of appeal,” he remarked.

Lawyer Atta Akyea maintained that there are civil litigants in this country who place a lot of confidence in the judiciary and that the country has an elaborate legal process where people could move their cases all the way from the lowest court to the Supreme Court, the highest court of the land to get redress.

However, Alfred Agbesi, National Democratic Congress (NDC) MP for Ashaiman, who is also the Chairman of the Judiciary Committee of Parliament, said people should not criticize President Mills for making the comment since he urged the Judiciary to be independent arbiters to help government get rid of criminals in society.