Akufo-Addo has nominated a surrogate as Special Prosecutor – Martin Amidu

Martin Alamisi Burnes Kaiser Amidu has described the nomination of Lawyer Kissi Agyebeng as his successor at the Office of Special Prosecutor (OSP) as “a surrogate” of persons implicated in the Agyapa Royalties Transaction Corruption Assessment report.

According to him, Kissi Agyebeng’s appointment is to safeguard the interests of persons the corruption assessment report implicated.

In a statement copied to GhanaWeb titled ‘Do not defame Martin Amidu in the propaganda to nominate a new Special Prosecutor’, the elaborative writer stated:

“Anybody deeply knowledgeable about the Agyapa Royalties Transaction Corruption Risk Assessment report which resulted in my eventual resignation as the first Special Prosecutor knows that one of the beneficiaries of the Agyapa Royalties Transaction is Africa Legal Associates whose contract to participate in the transaction was found to be contrary to the Public Procurement Act and tainted by bid-rigging.”

The former Special Prosecutor noted further that until 20 March 2020, Agyapa Royalties Limited was incorporated as Asaase Royalties Limited with the date of incorporation being 5 November 2019 in Jersey, the United Kingdom. Anybody who cares to know knows that the alter ego of Africa Legal Associates is a cousin of the President who also established Asaase Radio which began official transmission on 14 June 2020.

He continued: “The Agyapa Royalties Transaction records show the role the President’s cousin who established Africa Legal Associates, and Asaase Radio played with White & Case LLP, of London, one of the foreign law firms in the suspected corruption transaction.”

“It must, therefore, be worrying to any patriotic Ghanaian not afraid of the culture of silence to see Asaase Radio undertaking political propaganda beginning on 25 April 2021 to 26 April 2021 to prepare the minds of the Ghanaian and international public to accept the surrogate of the alter ego of the Asaase Radio station and Africa Legal Associates as the Special Prosecutor as mandated under section 4(1) of the Office of the Special Prosecutor Act, 2018 (Act 959).”

Martin Amidu further argued, “In the attempt of persons implicated in the Agyapa Royalties Transaction Corruption Assessment Report to pressurize the president to appoint their surrogate as the Special Prosecutor to safeguard their interests, the online reportage of Asaase Radio resorted to direct fabrications, lies, and omissions against me in its narration of the reasons for my resignation.”

He said, "the pro-NPP radio station shamefully pretended not to have read my rejoinder giving further and better particulars on my resignation dated 26 November 2020 to the Secretary to the president’s supposed reply to my resignation letter which we now know by experience that the president might not have instructed to be written at all.

“My functions or my judgement and decision as the Special Prosecutor to resign my office under Act 959 was not subject to the supervision or judgement of civil society actors let alone those of them who secretly attend Government policy-making meetings as I had occasion to point out in writing previously.

“In exercise of brazen impunity, Asaase Radio reported online a matter which never featured in my resignation for pure political propaganda to facilitate and enhance the status of its surrogate “Agyapa” Special Prosecutor even before the president could indicate his acceptance of the nominee and forward a request to parliament,” Amidu’s statement read further.

Read the full statement below.