Judicial Corruption Reflects Entire Ghanaian Society

By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.
Garden City, New York
Sept. 9, 2015
E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net

I don’t know that the suspension of the 34 judges and magistrates caught on audio- and videotapes collecting bribes by investigative reporter Anas Aremeyaw Anas means or translates into anything of epic or historical proportions (See “Two Judges Were Sacked After Our Exposé – Amaliba Feels Vindicated” MyJoyOnline.com 9/9/15). All the traditional three branches of democratic governance in the country, namely, the Executive, Legislature and Judiciary are thoroughgoing corrupt. Any objectively minded person, Ghanaian and non-Ghanaian alike, who watched the Supreme Court proceedings in the 2012 Presidential Election Petition came away with the quinine feeling that there was absolutely no justice in all the land. The judiciary is thoroughly and inexcusably partisan.

The situation may have been even worse under the “revolutionary” regime of Chairman Jerry John Rawlings, founding-father of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC), although Mr. Rawlings would have the world believe that it is rather the main opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) that is most guilty of tinkering with and negatively influencing the judicial system. For instance, Dr. Raymond Atuguba recalls staying in the house of an unnamed judge between 1997 and 1999, when Mr. Rawlings was sitting president, and witnessing legions of litigants with cases pending before the courts swarming the homes of judges like his host and the latter’s neighbors in a criminal attempt to bribe their way out of the administration of justice, or have judges twist the arms of justice in their favor.

Now, we don’t know how reliable his story is, when Dr. Atuguba observes that his host promptly rejected several of the packages containing bribe money, including one that had been mistakenly delivered to his anonymous host. The glaring implication here, of course, is that somehow while, indeed, the narrator’s host had not seemed to be on the take, his neighbors, on the other hand, were implicitly perfectly at ease with receiving kickbacks. The tired maxim of “Show me your friend…” of course, cannot be cavalierly discounted in this instance. In other words, even assuming that, indeed, Dr. Atuguba’s host rejected all the packages of kickbacks delivered to his house, nevertheless, the mere fact that such overtures did not seem to ebb in inflow, clearly means that not only was the entire judicial system wracked with rank corruption, Dr. Atuguba’s host had likely in some recent past been comfortably positioned on the take.

For all we care to know, Dr. Atuguba may well be feeling obligated to return a greatly appreciated favor by pretending, somehow, that his former host was the rare exception. I simply don’t this suave attempt to cover up for his unnamed former host, whom the quondam Mahama staffer unctuously claims had on several occasions solicited the assistance of his grateful guest “to drive some of the [bribe-toting] people away. Then also, both Dr. Atuguba and Mr. Abraham Amaliba have been too intimately caught up in the maelstrom of the rankly corrupt Mahama government to be taken to be as credible as they would have the rest of Ghanaian society perceive them to be. To be certain, as a fixture on the so-called National Democratic Congress’ Communication Team of professional spongers and parasites, Mr. Amaliba is likely as thoroughgoing corrupt as the reportedly suspended judges that he smugly wants to feel so morally superior to.

On the executive level of governance, we have seen the Mahama administration obscenely induce voters with overnight road-construction and electrification projects in the imminent lead-up to by-elections, such as was recently witnessed at Talensi, and presidential elections as well. Then also, we have had Mr. Kennedy Ohene Agyapong, the firebrand main opposition party’s parliamentarian publicly assert, in the wake of the Nayele Ametefe Scandal, that both National Democratic Congress and New Patriotic Party politicians are prime sponsors of drug barons and baronesses. And so, really what is new to wax jolly about here? Really?!