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Opinions of Wednesday, 25 November 2020

Columnist: Esther Domi

Corruption-laced Agyapa deal chased Amidu out

A dog that tries to bite its vicious owner will be severely tamed! The long-predicted resignation of the Special Prosecutor, Martin Amidu, from office has finally come to pass thanks to his daring to expose President Akufo-Addo’s hands in the rotten Agyapa Royalties Ltd transactions on which he released an analysis of risk of corruption and anti-corruption assessment report recently.

There is a long-held view that Amidu was appointed purposely to serve as a poodle to be remote-controlled from the Jubilee House. He, however, was oblivious of this hidden fact and tried to be independent and therefore was made to pay the price.

News flooded the airwaves Monday evening reporting the vacation of office of the Special Prosecutor followed by a press release from him and the resignation letter he submitted to the Office of the President. While many were not surprised others felt vindicated by the resignation.

The take of the man himself is of interesting note especially after the death of his mentor J.J. Rawlings and the looming critical elections. Revelations form his missive to the President indicate a developing bad blood between him and Akufo-Addo which results from the President trying to use Amidu as a mischief dog! This is evident in the third paragraph of the resignation letter of the SP:

“The one condition upon which I accepted to be nominated as the Special Prosecutor…was your firm promise to me that you will respect and ensure same by your Government for my independence and freedom of action as the Special Prosecutor. Several things have happened then.

But your reaction to my letter with reference number OSP/SCR/20/12/20 AND dated 16th October, 2020… conveying to you the conclusions and observations of the analysis of the risk of corruption and anti-corruption assessment of the Agyapa Royalties Limited transactions convinces me beyond every reasonable doubt that you had laboured under the mistaken belief that I could hold the office of the Special Prosecutor as your poodle.”

The next paragraph confirms his perception where he stated that the Chief of Staff delivered an urgent message from President instructing Mr. Amidu not to do anything with the report. Mr. Amidu felt this is a clear attempt to prevent him from taking further action against the corrupt members of the President’s family indicted in the report.

The President obviously was also afraid any further action by the SP was going to reveal his own involvement in the shameful corrupt deal and cause heavy disaffection for his ailing government which is facing rejection from the electorate in the upcoming general elections.

The unfolding events at the corruption-fighting front which undermines any success in the exercise has revealed President Akufo-Addo is not interested in fighting corruption. This explains his overt clearing of corruption scandals in his government since 2017 and the hounding out of office of the Auditor-General. With the resignation of the SP, the highway is now cleared for Akufo-Addo’s sakawa gang to speed up the final onslaught in their broad day robbery of the state.