{"id":464139,"date":"2018-02-14T01:37:26","date_gmt":"2018-02-14T01:37:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ghana-mma.com\/2018\/02\/14\/i-did-not-challenge-order-from-above-to-stop-corruption-prosecution-martin-amidu\/"},"modified":"2018-02-14T01:37:26","modified_gmt":"2018-02-14T01:37:26","slug":"i-did-not-challenge-order-from-above-to-stop-corruption-prosecution-martin-amidu","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2018\/02\/14\/i-did-not-challenge-order-from-above-to-stop-corruption-prosecution-martin-amidu\/","title":{"rendered":"I did not challenge &#8216;order from above&#8217; to stop corruption prosecution &#8211; Martin Amidu"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div id=\"medsection1\">\n<!-- End of html generated by this->header() --><\/p>\n<p class=\"floatLeft\">General News of Tuesday, 13 February 2018<\/p>\n<p class=\"floatRight\"><strong>Source: <\/strong>Myjoyonline.com <\/p>\n<p>2018-02-13<\/p>\n<div class=\"article-left\">\n<p class=\"article-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/ghanamma.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/82482074.295.jpg\" alt=\"Amidu Prosecutor\" title=\"Amidu Prosecutor\" width=\"295\" height=\"140\" \/><span class=\"image_caption\"><span>Martin Amidu<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"noPrint\">\n<div id=\"537626303\" style=\"width:300;height:250;margin:0;padding:0\">\n<p>\t\t  <noscript><iframe loading=\"lazy\" id=\"b2ad7fa7fd\" name=\"b2ad7fa7fd\" src=\"http:\/\/ghanaweb-d.openx.net\/w\/1.0\/afr?auid=537626303&amp;cb=151125813973067\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" width=\"300\" height=\"250\"><a href=\"\/\/ghanaweb-d.openx.net\/w\/1.0\/rc?cs=b2ad7fa7fd&amp;cb=151125813973067\"><\/p>\n<p>\t\t  <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/ghanamma.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/1518572246_717_ai\" border=\"0\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a><\/iframe><\/noscript><\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p style=\"clear:right\"> Special Prosecutor nominee Martin Amidu has revealed, political pressure halted the prosecution of interdicted public officials while he was Attorney-General.<\/p>\n<p>Martin Amidu said he was told that &#8220;orders from above&#8221; had forbidden the prosecution of the Chief Fire Officer, William Brown-Quaye and two of his deputies, Stephen Kandure and Cornelius Woedi.<\/p>\n<p>It was Lawra NPP MP, Anthony Karbo who brought up the matter at the Appointments Committee vetting the President&#8217;s nominee tasked to fight political corruption.<\/p>\n<p>He said, in 2010 while Martin Amidu was Interior Minister, he interdicted the officials accused of procurement irregularities by Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO).<\/p>\n<p>But he failed to prosecute these persons when he had the opportunity to do so after he was moved to the Attorney-General&#8217;s Department.<\/p>\n<p>Amidu was given the opportunity to explain his inaction.<\/p>\n<p>He suggested that as a former Interior Minister at the time he felt uncomfortable to take up the matter in his new position as Attorney-General.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I thought that the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) would handle that matter,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>The DPP, he said, later informed him that the case had tribal undertones. The Chief Fire Officer, William Brown-Quaye was also a cousin to the then President, the late John Evans Atta Mills.<\/p>\n<p>The DPP later told him she had been directed not to proceed with the prosecutions.<\/p>\n<p>The deputy Attorney-General Ebo Barton Oduro took the three dockets from the DPP which signaled an end to the prosecutions.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If I didn&#8217;t prosecute them that was because it is impossible to&#8221; he ended his submission. He said he did not want to create confusion by fighting with his deputy over the matter.<\/p>\n<p>He said being an anti-corruption advocate does not make him &#8220;foolhardy&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Martin Amidu has said the problem of Ghanaian society is that public officials have been too timid to challenge the status quo.<\/p>\n<p>Minority Chief Whip, Muntaka Mohammed Mubarak questioned the nominee&#8217;s ability to withstand political pressure following his ability to challenge the &#8220;orders from above&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p><!-- uploaded by: 31 updated by: -1 --><\/p>\n<p><!-- Start of html generated by this->footer() -->\n<\/div>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<a style=\"display:none\" rel=\"follow\" href=\"http:\/\/megatheme.ir\/\" title=\"\u0642\u0627\u0644\u0628 \u0648\u0631\u062f\u067e\u0631\u0633\">\u0642\u0627\u0644\u0628 \u0648\u0631\u062f\u067e\u0631\u0633<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>General News of Tuesday, 13 February 2018 Source: Myjoyonline.com 2018-02-13 Martin Amidu Special Prosecutor nominee Martin Amidu has revealed, political pressure halted the prosecution of interdicted public officials while he was Attorney-General. Martin Amidu said he was told that &#8220;orders from above&#8221; had forbidden the prosecution of the Chief Fire Officer, William Brown-Quaye and two [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":464062,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-464139","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/464139","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=464139"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/464139\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=464139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=464139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2018\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=464139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}