Former Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Godfred Yeboah Dame, has taken a swipe at current Attorney-General and Minister of Justice Dr. Dominic Ayine over the latter’s withdrawal of some key criminal cases against some top officials and the reasons he assigned to them.
Mr. Dame, speaking at a press conference on Friday, February 14, 2025, said Ghanaians ought to be scared for what has happened.
Dr. Ayine, addressing journalists this week, defended his decision to drop several high-profile cases, citing legal and ethical concerns.
Addressing journalists on Wednesday, February 12, Dr. Ayine explained that his decision was guided by professional integrity and legal principles.
“For ethical and professional reasons, I couldn’t in good conscience continue to prosecute some of the cases. The second was that some of the cases, in my own review and analysis of the charges, showed clearly that the charges were defective and some were far against the promptness of plain common sense,” he stated.
But responding to the reasons assigned by the A-G., Godfred Dame noted that Dr. Ayine quite reprehensibly relied solely on the case for the defence before exercising his discretion to discontinue the actions. He did not engage in any meaningful consultation with the Prosecution Division of the Office of Attorney-General before instructing the filing of the withdrawals and nolle prosequi in the cases against the senior members of the John Mahama government and other leading members of the NDC’’.
‘’The people of Ghana should be very scared if we have an Attorney-General whose prime consideration for the discontinuation of criminal cases involving the loss of billions of Ghana cedis, the position of defence lawyers on charges preferred against their clients rather than the interests of the Republic in prosecution of crime.’’
He further posited that ‘’even more scary and bizarre is the claim by Dr. Ayine that he did not consult President John Dramani Mahama before taking the monumental decision to discontinue the criminal cases. The cases involved the loss of colossal sums of taxpayers’ money and some related to the banking sector crisis, which affected the Ghanaian economy. The people of Ghana should indeed be extremely concerned and afraid by the vesting of prosecutorial authority in a person who can discontinue the prosecution of such important and high-profile cases without consulting the President of the Republic and members of Cabinet about it”.
By: Rainbowradioonline.com/Ghana
