Ghana’s ambulance saga is crazier than you think

In December 2021, Ghana’s Attorney General started prosecuting the Opposition Parliamentarian (MP) giving the government its biggest headaches in the powerful finance committee mandated with clearing the government’s budget. As the “ranking member” of the committee, the MP was the Opposition’s point man on finance matters and was critical to holding the lines against approval of the 2022 budget.

Was the man guilty?

Coming in the wake of the government’s biggest second-term crisis in the newly split parliament, the prosecution was immediately condemned by some independent analysts, myself included, as pure political persecution and an attempt to undermine democratic accountability. It was apparent then, as it is now, that the MP had been unfairly targeted, and some of us said so.

Last week, the Court of Appeal issued a majority decision that more or less vindicated the persecution theory, and acquitted the MP, overturning an earlier decision by the High Court that his trial should proceed because the prosecution had established a prima facie case. For many of us, this was a resounding blow to democratic accountability.

During the two and half years of the trial, commentators like myself have sparred over the MP’s liability in issuing a letter of credit (LC) as a payment guarantee to facilitate the delivery of 30 ambulances, abandoned since 2015 for not meeting specifications.

Read the full article originally published by brightsimons.com