Martin Amidu reveals how he got his five names

Mr. Martin Alamisi Burnes Kaiser Amidu who is awaiting parliamentary approval to become first Special Prosecutor has revealed the sources of his name he personally described as “nonsense syllable”.

According to him, he adopted some of the names on campus as a student in addition to what his parents officially gave him at birth.

“When I was born, my birthday was used to call me because in some customs babies are not named immediately so the Alamisi followed me,”

Amidu said he got the name ‘Burnes’ when he was at the Bawku middle boarding school.

“When we were at Bawku middle boarding, there was a picture of Sir Alan Burnes and everybody called me Alan Burnes… so I decided to call myself Burns”.

The nominee said he got the name ‘Kaiser’ while at the commercial school. According to him, he read about the German Kaiser in his history class and he grew fond of him thus the adoption of his name.

“I became the dining hall prefect and each time I stood to talk my friends would say, silent the Kaiser speaks,” he said.

The Special Prosecutor nominee noted that he bears the name ‘Amidu’ because it was his father’s name



Martin Alamisi Burnes Kaiser Amidu said at one point in his life he wanted to drop all his names and only maintain Alamisi Amidu but as he entered law school and read about Garvey Williams who said “what is there in a name, a name is a nonsense syllable” so he decided to keep them.

Mr. Amidu is a man who has earned the nickname ‘Citizen Vigilante’ for his no-nonsense stance and campaign against corruption, particularly in his own party National Democratic Congress (NDC) administration.

The Office of the Special Prosecutor will have the mandate to investigate and prosecute cases of alleged corruption under the Public Procurement Act 203 Act 63 and other corruption-related offenses implicating public officers, political office holders and their accomplices in the public sector.