Africa-Press – Ghana. The Member of Parliament for Asante Akyem North, Kwame Andy Appiah-Kubi should be given time to respond to the Office of the comment by the Office Special Prosecutor (OSP) to the effect that he was not cooperative in the investigations of the bribery allegations that he made, a Private legal practitioner Martin Kpebu has said.
He says that it was important to listen to him before coming to conclusions.
“We will urge Appiah-Kubi to come and speak,” he said on Saturday, January 6.
Mr Kpebu further indicated that discussions about the allegation against the businessman have even helped because the supposed businessman will not be scared to even walk to Parliament to do any such thing in the future.
While speaking on Wednesday, January 3, he said “At this stage, this story is still very fluid, you know how very sensitive this matter is, it keeps changing by the hour, so at this stage, I am not able to conclude.
“Mr Appiah-Kubi is an astute lawyer and we are yet to hear from him so it will be hard for me to conclude based on the OPS reports.
“I will be very surprised that after making all these allegations it turns out that he is not cooperative. That is why I want to hold my horses till Mr Appiah-Kubi is interviewed then we can juxtapose his responses with those of the OSP and then come to a conclusion.
“I am not saying Appiah-Kubi is a saint, but it will cast a slur on his reputation if he doesn’t respond.”
The Special Prosecutor (SP) has directed the closure of investigations into allegations that was made by Appiah-Kubi. The lawmaker had alleged that 80 Members of Parliament of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) received bribe from an unnamed businessman to back down on their demand for the resignation of Mr. Ken Ofori-Atta.
According to Mr Kissi Agyebeng, proceeding with investigations will not yield the desired results.
“…the Special Prosecutor directs the closure of the investigation
in respect of allegations that a well-known and wealthy businessman attempted
to bribe a section of the majority caucus of Parliament. The Special Prosecutor
determines that the institution of criminal proceedings, at this time, against the
OSP’s identified suspect would serve no useful purpose,” a report dated December 28.
The SP stated that, “The investigation may be re-opened should the circumstances and further facts so dictate.”
“This report is founded on regulation 31(1)(g) of the Office of the Special
Prosecutor (Operations) Regulations, 2018 (L.I. 2374), which mandates the OSP
to publish detected acts of corruption through the receipt, collection, or collation
of reports, documents, materials, complaints, allegations, information and
intelligence,” he wrote.
It would be recalled that the MP for Asante Akim North, Andy Appiah-Kubi alleged that a wealthy businessman attempted to bribe he and 79 of his colleague NPP MPs for them to stop their quest to have Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta removed from office.
Source: 3NEWS.COM
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