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Having been arrested on May 2015; yesterday 26th August 2019, which commenced officially the 2019 legal vacation for Ghana’s Judiciary, marked the fifth time, Gregory Afoko ‘innocent until proven guilty according to law’, would endure painfully in the continue unlawful sub-human custody and degrading treatments from the ‘coercive’ powers of government (police and BNI).
The state as almost always, charged with the prosecution of cases in criminal trials against an individual citizen has unlimited resources to mount and proceed with a prosecution, thus the fairness of proceedings is of critical importance. While it would never be possible to redress the imbalance of power and resources between an individual and the state, the protections provided to those accused of criminal offences are designed to allow the accused an adequate opportunity of defending themselves so that the Process meets appropriate standards of fairness.
This objectively reasonable standard is, as strangely, alien to Ghana under the Presidency of acclaimed Human rights lawyer and advocate Nana Akufo-Addo where the case of Gregory Afoko, described by James Agalga Member of Parliament of Ghana and former deputy interior minister as, a ‘POLITICAL PRISONER’, is being tried.
This article seeks to address the issue arising from Gregory’s case, whether or not this case is being tried according to proper standards of procedural fairness? As argued by Sir Robin Auld in his review of the criminal courts published in 2001 “Procedural fairness has always been a feature of our law….And the criminal process is not a game. It is a search for truth according to law, albeit by an adversarial process in which the prosecution must prove guilt to a heavy standard.”
Indeed, the sudden turn of events such as the blatant abuse of a prerogative authority by Attorney General in the unjustified, unaccounted, lack of transparence application for Nolle prosequie which makes ‘useless’ the four years trial; the questionable intent of this government to get a ‘compliant’ and ‘DEDICATED JUDGE’ which was announced by Information Minister Kojo Oppong Nkrumah; the government’s shopping for the high court judge Afua Merley Woods who in “forgetfulness and ignorance” of some basic points of law assumed for herself unjustified extended powers of appelate jurisdiction to review and reverse a decision of another high court in this very ‘Political case’ of a ‘Political Prisoner’ Gregory Afoko, cannot by any stretch of the legal imagination sit with set standards for procedural fairness by World Justice Project, which specifies that an ‘effective’ criminal justice system is one that is capable of investigating and adjudicating criminal offences successfully and in a timely manner, through a system that is impartial and non-discriminatory, and that is free of corruption and improper government influence, all while ensuring that the rights
Of both victims and the accused are effectively protected.
Like other common law jurisdictions, in England and Wales where our laws and practices emanates, the responsibility for continuing with or terminating (Nolle prosequie) proceedings lies entirely with the Crown Prosecution Service. If the prosecutor considers the proceedings should not continue, the case will be terminated at the earliest possible opportunity. This is at variance with criminal procedures in Ghana where Attorney General terminates a case which has traveled up to four years of trial.
The Nolle Prosequei, admittedly within the power of Attorney General, is a broad framework bill with no regulations and rules on how it should be exerised. Indeed, it’s worthy to note of venerable Supreme Court Justice Pwamang’s ‘subtle’ concession on attorney General’s abuse of the power to exercise Nolle prosequie ‘disguised’ in lawful orders and directions given by him to Attorney General that she prepares proper regulations and transparent rules in the exercise of Nolle Prosequie.
However, in the circumstances of this case, in consideration of the fortune spend on Lawyers, painful endurance by his family coupled with where Gregory, having served four years of ‘arduous’ trial and with about few numbered weeks for judgment to be given in his case; can this be seen to be fair and just in the minds of ordinary reasonable people for the state to discontinue Gregory’s case and start this case afresh? If No, can’t this abuse of power be subjected to Judicial review- the principles of legality, rationality and procedural impropriety? Much as Gregory was tried on the offense of conspiracy to commit murder and murder which is same as this new trial the ‘compliant’ judge is unjustifiable willing to proceed with, can’t the new suspect be tried separately? Doesn’t this firm the suspicion that the state has no or little evidence to convict Gregory? Doesn’t this further the definition of who a Political Prisoner is for that matter Gregory? The state foresaw it would lose the case, innit? Why can’t this present government trust the independence of our court in doing justice to this case but rather bent on finding Gregory guilty through ‘their’ proxy and ‘compliant’ judge?
Disappointing as it would seem, Gregory will have to painfully endure degrading custody of coercive force of the state in another two months of (non-trial) legal vacation.
The Amnesty International, a renowned body which subscribes to ensuring the respect for every individual’s human rights and freedoms who’ve petitioned Commission for Human Rights and Administrative Justice to ‘institute a full scale investigation into circumstances that led to Mr. Gregory Afoko’s inability to enjoy his bail granted by the High Court’ expressed their regret in the ‘slipshod’ manner with which this case is being handled via special influences of this present Akufo-Addo government’s.’
The Executive Director Robert Akoto Amoafo stated “If you have a law in our log book that simply says that if a person is granted bail, the bail must be respected. In this case, the bail was not respected. The person was kept all the period when he was supposed to be on bail, and all of a sudden, the person’s bail was rescinded by another court. This is a mockery of our legal system and a worry for us as a human rights advocate.”
Can we tell the intention and motives of this present government to start afresh, trial of this case, making nonsense of the four years trial which saw the state producing fourteen as many as (14) witnesses?
Source: Thepressradio.com
Communist: Stephen Nsia
