Ghana's 1992 Constitution gives Parliament the power to check the Executive. This power includes the duty to approve or disapprove political appointments of the Executive, that is, the President of the Republic.

This august responsibility of approving the appointees of the President, who include ministerial nominees and Supreme Court nominees, has been entrusted to the Appointment Committee, which vets these nominees and recommends their appointment or otherwise to the plenary.

But on a number of occasions, the committee, like many other committees of the House, has been accused of being induced in order to perform its responsibilities. Members of the committee have on several occasions been accused of taking monies from the persons who appear before them.

Some of these allegations have been investigated, but they continue to recur, which leaves a lot of unanswered questions.

Here are some of the instances in which the committee has been accused of taking money from persons who appear before it:

2017 Appointments Committee bribery scandal:


Mahama Ayariga

In January 2017, the current Majority Leader and Member of Parliament for Bawku Central, Mahama Ayariga, alleged that each member of the Appointments Committee of Parliament (ACP) was given a GH¢3,000 bribe by the then Minister-designate for Energy, Boakye Agyarko, to facilitate his vetting.

According to a report by graphic.com.gh, the Bawku Central MP, in a radio interview in 2017, alleged that Alhaji Mohammed-Mubarak had given GH¢3,000 to each Minority member on the ACP.

Ayariga is reported to have said that, following rumours that the money was given by Agyarko, who was being vetted for the position of Minister of Energy, he confronted Alhaji Mohammed-Mubarak over the source.

According to him, Alhaji Mohammed-Mubarak told him that it was Osei-Owusu who had given the money to him, with the explanation that it was from Agyarko.

He added that he, together with his fellow Minority MPs, returned the money because they had initially thought it was a sitting allowance.

Alhaji Mohammed-Mubarak denied the allegation. A five-member committee was instituted to investigate the matter.

Appointments Committee members received monies from Chief of Staff - Joe Wise confirms

In January 2025, former First Deputy Speaker of Parliament, Joseph Osei-Owusu, stated that members of the Appointments Committee receive payments in the line of their duties but said the amount received falls short of being a bribe.

Speaking in an interview on JoyNews on January 29, 2025, Osei-Owusu, affectionately known as Joe Wise, recalled his time as Chairman of the Appointments Committee, when the Chief of Staff typically provided committee members with money, usually after they had vetted ministerial nominees, acknowledging that these monetary payments were intended to facilitate the committee's work smoothly and efficiently.


Joseph Osei-Owusu is the former First Deputy Speaker in parliament

According to the former Member of Parliament for Bekwai, such actions should not be linked to or described as bribery. He expressed his strong disapproval of such claims.

Joe Wise further explained that the payments from the Chief of Staff do not influence or sway the committee's decision-making during the vetting and subsequent approval of ministerial nominees, emphasising that these payments do not give any nominee an unfair advantage.

"When I joined the Appointments Committee, most of the time at the close of our work, the Chief of Staff would bring money to the members of the committee. It's like facilitating our work. I wonder why anybody could link that to bribery. How can it be influence peddling? It does not give advantage or disadvantage to anybody," he said.

He made these claims while reacting to a claim by lawyer and activist, Oliver Barker-Vormawor, that members of the committee have been taking bribes.

Memo showing Deputy Minority Leader Patricia Appiagyei has returned


The memo was allegedly from Patricia Appiagyei (M) to Annoh Dompreh (L) and Afenyo-Markin (R)

A memo to the leadership of the Minority Caucus of Parliament, allegedly from its Deputy Leader, Patricia Appiagyei, showed that she had returned an amount of GH¢70,000 she described as a "gift" to members of the Appointments Committee from the Majority Chief Whip.

In a memorandum dated September 2, 2026, and addressed to Minority Chief Whip Frank Annoh-Dompreh, with Minority Leader Alexander Afenyo-Markin copied, Appiagyei said she was returning the money as a matter of principle and also because she did not know its source.

“It is with regret that I return the amount of seventy thousand cedis (GH¢70,000.00) allocated to me as an advance of money from the Majority Chief Whip of Parliament of Ghana. I am returning the money on the basis of the fact that, primarily, I do not know the source of the money being given to me,” part of the Memo read.

Fake!: Minority Caucus denies memo showing Patricia Appiagyei returned GH¢70k vetting 'gift'

The alleged memo further explained that Appiagyei did not want to derive any financial benefit from a process involving the vetting of members of the governing side's leadership.

According to the document, accepting the money could create the impression that she was benefiting financially from a process involving colleagues on the other side, specifically Mahama Ayariga and Zanetor Agyemang-Rawlings, whose nominations were being considered.

However, information reaching GhanaWeb indicates that the Minority Caucus has vehemently denied any knowledge of the memo.

According to the caucus, the document is not authentic. Copies of the memo, which have since gone viral on social media, reportedly contain fake stamps.

The Office of the Special Prosecutor has now opened an investigation into the matter.

BAI

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