Chairman of the Constitution Review Committee, Prof Henry Kwasi Prempeh, says the current Attorney General model has failed and no longer commands public trust.
He warned that giving prosecutorial powers to an active politician has undermined the fight against corruption.
Speaking on Joy News on December 25, Prof Prempeh said the evidence from Ghana’s own experience shows the system is not working. “It’s obvious that if it was going to work, why hasn’t it worked?” he asked.
He said Ghana has tried different approaches in the past, including career attorneys general, but the current arrangement is different.
“Our current attorney general setup is not a career attorney general setup. It is a politician, Attorney General, setup,” he said.
Prof Prempeh stressed that constitutions must reflect human realities.
“We are human beings. Constitutions are made for human beings,” he said, adding that it must be assumed someone will occupy the office with political interests.
He said the problem is deeper when the Attorney General is an active politician.
“He is a real politician, an active politician, he is an elected politician,” he said, noting that the office holder is a member of a political party and part of the government.
According to him, the contradiction becomes obvious when that same person is expected to lead the fight against corruption.
“You’ve given him power to fight corruption. Corruption doesn’t have a party label. Corruption is corruption,” he said.
Prof Prempeh said it should not be surprising that very few corruption cases involve incumbents. “How is it any surprise that we have had so few corruption cases against incumbents?” he said.
Responding to arguments that alternating governments will eventually prosecute wrongdoing, he questioned the logic.
“You have four years, you come during your term, you don’t prosecute any of your people, and you expect that by the time that the other side comes, then they will start prosecuting you,” he said.
He warned that such expectations are not guaranteed. “But what if they don’t come? Nothing is saying that the other side will actually come or also stay on for much longer,” he said.
Beyond prosecutions, Prof Prempeh said public perception has become a major problem. “Even the perception, the people don’t even trust the credibility of the process,” he said.
He explained that even genuine cases are viewed through a partisan lens. “If you came and said, look, I’m going after this target genuinely, because evidence is leading me this way, Ghanaians will doubt you,” he said.
According to him, the suspicion is automatic. “Oh, you are going after this person because you are NDC and he’s NPP,” he said, adding that no explanation is enough to change that perception.
Prof Prempeh said this credibility gap damages institutions. “If you keep doing that, you are destroying trust in the institution,” he said.
He warned that selective prosecutions followed by pardons only worsen the situation. “The other side will come and pardon another person,” he said, questioning how such cycles can ever build justice.
For him, the conclusion is unavoidable. “We’ve gotten to a point where, look, certain things are not working. Let’s agree that they are not working,” he said.
Prof Prempeh noted that Ghana is not alone in reaching this conclusion. “There are countries that have independent anti-corruption agencies where the Attorney General does no prosecution,” he said.
He cited Kenya as an example. “In Kenya, in the 2010 constitution, the Attorney General does no prosecution at all, zero,” he said, adding that the decision followed similar experiences under a common law system.
According to him, those countries concluded that the model simply does not work. “They’ve concluded that this Attorney General is not working on prosecution matters,” he said.
Prof Prempeh said Ghana must also be guided by evidence from its own system. “Let us just accept the evidence we’ve gathered that in our system, when you give prosecutorial power to a politician, Attorney General, this is how it works,” he said.
He acknowledged that the model has worked in limited cases elsewhere, notably the United States. “The only other place I know where it has worked before is the US,” he said.
However, he said that the system relies on strong conventions. “They’ve built a long-standing convention around that power,” he said, noting that career officials handle prosecutions.
He cited examples where US prosecutors have pursued members of the ruling party. “Joe Biden was president, his son was being executed,” he said.
Still, Prof Prempeh cautioned against blindly copying models. “I’m not saying it’s entirely impossible,” he said.
But he insisted Ghana must adopt arrangements suited to its own context. “We were supposed to do things that fit the Ghanaian condition,” he said.
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