Charles Bissue, former Secretary of the Inter-Ministerial Committee on illegal mining
The lawyer representing Charles Bissue, the former Secretary of the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Illegal Mining, has raised concerns over the court's decision to grant an arrest warrant for his client.
Speaking in an interview with Joy FM on June 8, 2023, Lawyer Nana Agyei Baffour Awuah alleged that the court, unaware of all the surrounding details, made an error by issuing the warrant solely based on information provided by the Special Prosecutor.
“The arrest warrant would have been secured ex parte, which is without notice to Charles Bissue. So, the court would have acted based solely on information the Special Prosecutor gave to it. The court made that order without being fed with the global evidence in this matter and granted the arrest order without properly exercising its discretion, not through its fault,” myjoyonline.com quoted him as having said on June 8, 2023.
The lawyer emphasized that had the court been made aware of all the relevant facts, including the pending suits and motions for interlocutory injunctions, the order for his client's arrest would not have been granted.
“If the court was privy to certain facts, including but not limited to pending suits and motions for interlocutory injunctions, it would not have granted or made an order for that arrest.”
He emphasized that the court's decision to grant the arrest order was made without the benefit of global evidence and without exercising its discretion properly.
The Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) has reportedly secured a warrant for the arrest of the former secretary to the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Illegal Mining (IMCIM).
This development came to light in a post shared by JoyNews on Twitter on Thursday, June 8, 2023.
It is not clear why the warrant was issued, but it might be related to the issues surrounding the work of the IMCIM, which have led to the arrest of the former chairman of the committee and former Minister of Science and Technology, Prof. Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng, by the OSP.
The former minister was arrested on May 16, 2023, in relation to some corruption allegations in the work of the IMCIM.
However, Prof. Frimpong-Boateng has been granted a GHC2 million bail by the Office of the Special Prosecutor.
It may be recalled that Charles Bissue had previously approached the High Court in an attempt to prevent the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) from investigating him over allegations of corruption and corruption-related offenses involving a public officer.
His argument was that an investigation could not commence without providing him with a copy of the petition that formed the basis of the investigation.
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