Private Legal Practitioner Bobby Banson has stressed the need for the Attorney General’s Office to operate independently from the Ministry of Justice.
This viewpoint comes in light of the recent developments concerning the investigations into the case involving Cecilia Dapaah, the former Sanitation Minister.
The Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO) has expressed its plan to hand over the docket related to the former Sanitation Minister to the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP).
This action is in response to the guidance provided by the Office of the Attorney General, which advised against initiating money laundering investigations into Cecilia Dapaah.
The Attorney General’s office identified the OSP’s failure to uncover evidence of corruption or corruption-related offences as the reason for this guidance.
At the 14th Commonwealth Regional Conference of Heads of Anti-corruption Agencies in Africa, Maame Yaa Tiwa Addo-Danquah, the Executive Director of EOCO, announced that her organisation could not proceed further in this case.
In a discussion with Umaru Sanda Amadu on Citi FM’s Eyewitness News on Monday, Mr Banson underscored that instances like this strengthen the argument for the separation of the AG’s office from the Justice Ministry.
“It is matters like this that bring to the fore the argument that we have to decouple the office of the AG from the Ministry of Justice. And I think that this is one instance where the clamour for that decoupling be made louder until those that are in the position to make this call come to life do,” he stated.
He further added, “Because corruption and all those that are related to it most of the time is a matter of perception and it is in the interest of the one who has been accused to say that he who has said so must prove.”
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