Adom-Otchere’s “So What?” May Not Be That Simple

I did not see nor hear Mr. Paul Adom-Otchere’s rather trenchant rejoinder to Mr. Martin ABK Amidu’s assertion that while the latter was in the process of putting his corruption and anti-corruption assessment report on the Egyapa Mineral Royalties Investment Contract or Deal together, the Finance Minister, Mr. Kenneth Ofori-Atta, visited Mr. Amidu at the private residence of the recently resigned Independent Special Prosecutor (See “Ken Ofori-Atta Visited Your House and So What? – Paul Adom-Otchere Rubbishes Amidu’s Claim” Ghanaweb.com 11/20/20).

Mr. Adom-Otchere, the locally renowned TV personality, is apt to sarcastically point out that the former Independent Special Prosecutor is hell-bent on smearing the integrity, image and reputation of the Finance Minister because Mr. Amidu has publicly stated that he and Mr. Ofori-Atta have been friends for quite sometime now, although the nature of such friendship at the time of this writing was not known to yours truly. Very likely, whatever friendship existed between these two personalities transcended official bounds or circles.

If so, then as Mr. Adom-Otchere notes, there was absolutely nothing wrong or out of the ordinary or remiss with Mr. Ofori-Atta’s payment of an informal visit to Mr. Amidu at the latter’s private residence. Nonetheless, what is worthy of note here is the fact that in relating the nature of the aforesaid visit to the media, Mr. Amidu clearly sought to suggest that the visit to his house by Mr. Ofori-Atta necessarily and primarily had to do with some sort of influence peddling or an inappropriate attempt on the part of the Finance Minister to dissuade the extant Independent Special Prosecutor from writing and/or publishing any report that could be legally or judicially damning to the authors of the Agyapa Mineral Royalties Investment Deal.

If so, then unmistakably what Mr. Amidu sought to imply about his alleged visit by Mr. Ofori-Atta was to prove beyond any iota or shadow of a doubt that the loyalty and/or conscience of the Atta-Mills-fired Attorney-General and Minister of Justice could not be bought. The preceding assertion may very well have validity because whatever Mr. Amidu may have discussed with the Finance Minister, clearly does not appear to have influenced the contents of the Agyapa Mineral Royalties Investment Deal as preemptively published by Mr. Amidu, prior to the statutorily stipulated demand that the President is officially availed a copy of the report before the contents of the latter was put into the public domain. Which may clearly indicate that Mr. Amidu flagrantly violated the terms of reference of his appointment as the Independent Special Prosecutor.

Now, I don’t know what the legal or judicial penalty for such fiduciary breach may entail, but I am also inclined to believe that it needs to be doggedly and vigorously pursued and promptly redressed by the Presidency. You see, just because he fiercely or fervidly wants justice to be delivered, with the interest of the nation foregrounded or as his foremost objective, does not in any way, shape or form authorize Mr. Amidu to take the law into his own hands, as the extant Independent Special Prosecutor. He has said that President Akufo-Addo wanted to make him his “poodle,” a thinly veiled or coded word for an attempt by an Akan-descended Nana Akufo-Addo to stereotypically hold Mr. Amidu in disdainful subjection as a Northern- or Frafra-descended bona fide Ghanaian citizen. Whatever the real case scenarios may be, this is a very serious allegation against the veteran human rights lawyer and campaigner.

For me, personally, though, what is inescapably disturbing here is the apparent presumption by the Finance Minister that, somehow, he could cavalierly foist his widely touted heavy investment expenditure in the presidential ambitions of the now-President Akufo-Addo on the Ghanaian taxpayer, by fraudulently rigging up the Agyapa Mineral Royalties Investment Deal in such a way that a remarkable chunk of the profits accruing therefrom could be criminally siphoned into the private “piggybank” of Mr. Ofori-Atta. I have arrived at this very disturbing conclusion because a notorious relative of the Finance Minister and a former Executive-Director of the Danquah Institute (DI) never lets the least opportunity slip by without reminding ruling party members and supporters to fully and sedulously appreciate the fact that it was Mr. Ofori-Atta, more than anybody else, who single-handedly footed the lion’s share of the tab of Nana Akufo-Addo’s presidential campaigns. Which is precisely why the cat should never have been put in charge of the mice, as it were.

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By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., PhD

English Department, SUNY-Nassau

Garden City, New York

November 21, 2020

E-mail: [email protected]