Former Auditor-General, Daniel Yao Domelevo, says the Special Prosecutor’s recent lamentation about the attitude of the judiciary towards his office does not reflect positively on the image of the judiciary.
Mr. Kissi Agyebeng on Wednesday, November 29, accused the judiciary of exhibiting some disregard for his office’s powers with what he sees as hasty dismissiveness of its cases.
Speaking at a press conference held in Accra, Mr Agyebeng described the trend as troubling and inimical to the fight against corruption.
Reacting to the Special Prosecutor’s allegations, Mr. Domelevo said the use of technicalities to frustrate anti-graft cases in court does not augur well for the image of the judiciary.
“In my considered opinion, it doesn’t reflect positively on the image of the judiciary because some of us are not lawyers so they can pardon us. As the Office of the President used to say, we think when you go to court you must be looking for justice not just a technicalities.
“So when the law is becoming too technical or so – in the words of the National Security Minister, interpreted in one way such that others can think that no, the judiciary is always for one side of the coin I don’t think it augurs very well for them,” he said.
He added that the judiciary must ensure that the public does not lose confidence in their ability to deliver justice.
“I am not saying that they’re wrong every time they take their decisions, but like Honourable Kan Dapaah said the decisions must be such that we can say ‘oh, this one we agree’ and if we normally agree with them and there are some that we don’t agree with we can give them the benefit of the doubt that maybe it is professional, it is technical, we didn’t understand it.
“But when it is a common sense issue and even we think it doesn’t pass the test of common sense then we wonder how a professional will see it in the future. It affects the fight against corruption seriously because mind you, like I said earlier on, once you start fighting corruption, corruption will fight you.
“And the ultimate place that you go when you’re fighting corruption is the court and if you’re not sure the court is going to do the right thing or support what is right then it becomes a problem,” he said.
He urged the Special Prosecutor to keep up the fight despite the many challenges.