Special Prosecutor will only jail houseflies – Jacob Osei Yeboah

Barely a week after President Nana Akufo-Addo assented to the Office of the Special Prosecutor Bill, the independent presidential candidate in the 2016 presidential elections, Jacob Osei Yeboah, believes the Office will only succeed in jailing what he described as “houseflies”.

“I have heard there is something the president assented to called Independent Prosecutor,” he said. “It is only houseflies that it will jail.”

“They are not coming to do anything. It will end up on the shelves. I can tell you categorically that this government has lost the fight against corruption from the word go. When they came up with the stories of the so-called missing 200 cars, did we see those cars? So, they have lost the fight from the transition,” he explained in Twi on Onua FM’s morning show Yen Nsempa on Monday.

By giving his assent to the Bill, President Akufo-Addo paved the way for government to strengthen the process of accountability, good governance and the fight against corruption, in fulfilment of one of his campaign promises.

The President was hopeful that the establishment of the Office of the Special Prosecutor would be an important step in the collective determination to rooting out corruption in the public life of the country.

But Jacob Osei Yeboah is not optimistic about the independence and success of the independent prosecutor in fighting corruption since, he argues, that person will be appointed by the President.

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He also questioned how the selection of whoever is going to occupy the Office will be done.

“Ex-President [John] Kufuor started the process of reviewing our constitution and this was continued by [late] Professor [John Evans Atta] Mills but because the NDC officials at the time saw that certain things in the law would not favor them, they discontinued the process. But I’m surprised not to hear NPP campaign with constitutional review [but] rather office of Independent Prosecutor. That should tell us that the NPP government cannot fight the canker,” he told Bright Kwesi Asempa.

So far, two names are making rounds as likely candidates for position of Independent Prosecutor.

They are Anthony Akoto Ampaw, a respected lawyer who is known for his fight for media freedom over the years, and Philip Addison, the lead counsel for the President and the New Patriotic Party (NPP) during the 2012 election petition hearing.

“Already, the opposition NDC and former president John Mahama are saying the Office of the Special Prosecutor will be used for political witch-hunting and these comedies would continue until that office becomes obsolete and I can tell you only people with ‘no political weight’ will be harassed with it,” Mr Osei Yeboah, popularly called JOY 2012, asserted.