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Opinions of Monday, 3 June 2019

Columnist: Rockson Adofo

Oh no, Alfred Agbesi Woyome is still walking a free man in Ghana

Alfred Agbesi Woyome Alfred Agbesi Woyome

If a prophet had prophesied to me that Alfred Agbesi Woyome, the certified Ghanaian swindler of the 21st Century Ghana, would be walking down the streets of Ghana a free within say, a maximum of six months of NPP coming into power, I would have mocked him. However, the truth has come to stare me in the face like a dragon with its mouth widely opened and about to swallow me.

Upon all the public, particularly myself and Hon. Martin Amidu’s brouhaha over the gargantuan swindling of Ghana by Alfred Agbesi Woyome and his cohorts including that disgraceful Attorney General, Mrs Betty Mould-Iddrisu, Woyome is still having the last laugh.

Is it a political ineptitude, connivance or judicial incompetence or the greasing of the palms of some judges with wads of Ghana Cedis that Alfred Agbesi Woyome is still left a free man eating sumptuously, driving in luxury cars and sleeping in well-furnished mansions? I can’t get my head around this. Were the NPP only fooling us when they promised the nation that they would collect the money from Woyome as soon as they came to power? Was it just a political talk without any substance?

Everybody knows, including you and me, that Woyome was aided to dupe the nation without having actually done any work for, or signed any contract with, the government. He himself confessed on air in the studio of Peace FM radio to this claim I am making today. Why can’t we by law compel him to pay back the money with or without interest? As he is availing himself of the loopholes in the Ghana justice system not to pay the money, why can’t we goal him for life at the Nsawam High Detention prisons if he is craftily denying payment of the GHC51.2 million he has robbed Ghana of?

I know very well that in Ghana, if one steals a goat, fowl, sheep or farm produce of say, a basketful of cassava, cocoyam or plantain, the culprit is sentenced to five to fifteen years in jail. However, here is someone who has stolen million times of the value of a goat, sheep or cassava but the Ghana justice system fearful of super rich criminals, is pathetically looking on while Woyome the "big, big thief man" as my fellow Indian work colleague normally calls those who are thieves or perceived by him to be thieves, is still invoking stupid excuses to get off the hook.

If in Ghana the law has proven conspicuously to be an ass, then so be it. "The law is an ass" means " The law, as created by legislators or as administered by the justice system, cannot be relied upon to be sensible or fair". We should all have ourselves to blame for the rot going on in the country and should have ourselves collectively blamed if a radical means emerges to rectify the anomalies ongoing in the country. It does not make any sense to me to see Alfred Agbesi Woyome steal millions of Cedis and walks a free man all because of his political might or affiliation while the other person stealing GHC100 or cassava goes to jail for years. This is really stupid of us as a nation and people, I have to be frank with my fellow Ghanaians.

Is there no any effective means to oblige Woyome to cough up the money he was aided by the NDC party and government to steal from Ghana? Would he not have refunded the money to the State if a military regime not in his camp had taken over from the NDC?

I detest the slow, biased and unethical application of the laws of Ghana by our politicians and the judicial system.

Simply put, sensible Ghanaians require the restitution of the money so stolen by Alfred Agbesi Woyome, the Ghanaian PhD holder in swindling, to Ghana. We do not want to hear any more of ifs or buts from whomever. The Attorney General must be up and doing!.