Ghana will move faster if we treat corrupt people as thieves - Kofi Bentil

Vice President of IMANI Ghana, Kofi Bentil has stated that corruption is still rife in Ghana because even though the country is very corrupt, no one has been jailed for committing the offence yet.

Speaking at a media dialogue on the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP), the legal practitioner stated that the country can move faster “if we could find a way to treat corrupt people as thieves’.

He said, “if you trace the malfunctioning of our systems and our country as a whole, you’ll find a number of things, we do not lack resources, we spend enough money on anything but we don’t get the right performance out of those things and it’s because of corruption”.

He said even though the powers to deal with corruption lied with the Attorney General (AG), they haven’t been able to deliver on that mandate because a lot of corruption cases are linked to the executive wing of the government which the AG is part of.

“A lot of corruption emanates or relates to the executive, the president, his appointees and the Attorney General is part of the executive. Regardless of the competence, etc, they can be removed from office if they try to do just their job”, Kofi Bentil said.

He added that it became important to take the power of prosecution from the Attorney General because of the conflict of interest, subsequently the need for the Office of the Special Prosecutor.