The Alliance for Social Equity and Public Accountability (ASEPA) has said the conventional citizen vigilante tag imposed on the current holder of the Office of the Special Persecutor, Mr Martin Amidu, is only out of hype and not merit.

Speaking on Okay Fm on Wednesday September 23, 2020, Executive Secretary of ASEPA, Ernest Thompson, told Kwame Nkrumah Tikese that Mr Amidu, since his appointment as the first Special Prosecutor, has failed to deliver any results, hence their call for his impeachment.

“Kwame, the 30 months he has spent in office has made us all realise that Martin Amidu was just an overhyped person, totally overhyped. We have all been touting him as a citizen vigilante, he has not proven to be a citizen let alone a vigilante,” he stated.

Speaking on the history of the Special Prosecutor, Ernest Thompson pronounced that Mr Martin Amidu despite once holding the position of the Attorney General under the Johh Mills administration has always been an incompetent character.

“Let me say it today that Martin Amidu has always been incompetent. Do you know Martin Amidu has been an Attorney General before? Tell me a single case Martin Amidu successfully prosecuted when he was the attorney General. It was the same redundancy he exhibited when he was the Attorney General that got him sacked. He later sent Woyome to court but can you believe that Martin Amidu paid the first two trenches of the monies paid to Woyome, he paid it and after that sent Woyome to court. Such level of incompetence is unheard of,” he fumed.

ASEPA in an assessment report presented to the Office of the President has recommended the activation of article 146 to cause the removal of Martin Amidu from office as Special Prosecutor on grounds of incompetence.

"In accordance with the law, we recommend that the processes of Article 146 be activated to impeach Mr. Amidu on the grounds of incompetence.”


ASEPA has also recommended the swift replacement of Mr Amidu saying this will bring about a more positive result from the office.

"We believe that a new person appointed to that office would bring more effective leadership to the office, which may result in a more positive result for the office and help the office regain the initial glory it has lost under the leadership of Mr. Martin A.B.K Amidu."

ASEPA further recommended that since, "the current position of the law does not allow the occupant of the Special Prosecutor to be fired; we recommend that the law is reviewed to allow the occupant of the office of the Special Prosecutor to be fired for non-performance.

"We recommend that the office of the Attorney General and the board of the OSP, supervise the proper setting of the structures of the office of the Special Prosecutor to ensure effective investigation, prosecution and other administrative duties since Mr. Amidu has been unable to do so since he was appointed."

See below the full assessment report by ASEPA:

SPECIAL REPORT ASSESSMENT OF THE 30 MONTHS IN OFFICE OF THE SPECIAL PROSECUTOR

BACKGROUND

In January 2018, in fulfillment of the campaign promise of President Akufo-Addo, the Office of the Special Prosecutor was created by an Act of Parliament.

The creation of the office was greeted with a lot of enthusiasm and public acceptance. The cancer of corruption that was almost swallowing the country up was given some legal remedy that was going to help curb it.

Subsequent to that, the President named Mr. Martin A.B.K Amidu as the first occupant of that office.

The appointment of Mr A.B.K Amidu received a lot of public praise for two reasons. 1. Because he was NOT a member of the President’s Party 2. And also because Mr. Amidu had been active in several corruption cases against his own political party.

Therefore, the expectations of the public for Mr Amidu to deliver was never in doubt.

KEY OBSERVATIONS

Thirty Months down the line, below are our overall assessment of Mr Martin Amidu and the Office of the Special Prosecutor.

-The Office of the Special Prosecutor has NOT initiated any legal proceedings against any major corruption Scandal that has happened between 2018-2020.

-Reports on major investigations conducted by the Office of the Special Prosecutor have NEVER been made public.

-The Office of the Special Prosecutor has been adequately resourced by the Government with un-used budgetary allocations returned to the State coffers for two conservative years.

-The Special Prosecutor has NO well-structured investigative and prosecution unit in place accounting for the general lack of performance.

-The Special Prosecutor does NOT maintain a good working relationship with his staff, thereby creating an atmosphere of confusion in the office, partly accounting for his redundancy.

-The Special Prosecutor has turned his office into a book review centre, instead of a prosecution unit.

-The non-performance of the office of the Special Prosecutor has further deepened that lack of confidence in the state offices of accountability.

-The non-performance has also contributed to the lower rankings of Ghana in the global corruption perception indices.

RECOMMENDATIONS

-The current position of the law does NOT allow the occupant of the Special Prosecutor to be fired; we recommend that the law is reviewed to allow the occupant of the office of the Special Prosecutor to be fired for non-performance.

-We recommend that the office of the Attorney General and the board of the OSP, supervise the proper setting of the structures of the office of the Special Prosecutor to ensure effective investigation, prosecution and other administrative duties since Mr Amidu has been unable to do so since he was appointed.

CONCLUSION

Considering the number of issues arising from the assessment, we believe that the nonperformance of the office of the Special Prosecutor is largely due to the incompetence of Mr A.B.K Amidu (The Special Prosecutor).

In accordance with the law, we recommend that the processes of Article 146 be activated to impeach Mr Amidu on the grounds of incompetence.

We believe that a new person appointed to that office would bring more effective leadership to the office which may result in a more positive result for the office and help the office regain the initial glory it has lost under the leadership of Mr Martin A.B.K Amidu.

Mensah Thompson

Executive Director,

ASEPA