The Attorney General has dismissed claims by former Deputy Finance Minister, Cassiel Ato Forson, that he is been prosecuted by the state because of his stance on the controversial E-levy.
The former deputy Minister is being prosecuted for causing financial loss to the state over the purchase of some ambulances in 2017 under the Mahama administration. He has attributed his prosecution to his stiff opposition to government’s new tax measures.
However, in a statement the Attorney General’s department said the claims of Mr. Ato Forson are “laden with factual misrepresentations and calculated at scandalizing the criminal proceedings pending in the High Court against the Member of Parliament and exposing the Attorney-General to prejudice and hatred”.
The statement signed by a Deputy Attorney-General and Minister for Justice, Diana Asonaba Dapaah stressed “investigations into the financial crimes perpetrated against the Republic of Ghana in the matter of the failed purchase of ambulances for the State began in 2017. Same (investigations) had been ongoing since 2017 with a number of statements taken from various persons at different points in time, including the Rt. Hon. Alban Bagbin, former Minister for Health (now Speaker of the Parliament of Ghana), Mr. Kwaku Agyeman-Mensah, Madam Sherry Ayittey and Dr. Alex Segbefia, all former Ministers for Health as well as the first accused”.
Addressing the press on the charges, Mr. Ato Forson said: “Ladies and Gentlemen of the Press, I have had to call you this morning for the singular purpose of responding to the news doing the rounds on social and mainstream media that certain charges have been preferred against me by the Attorney General of the Republic, the Honourable Godfred Yeboah Dame. Though I am yet to be formally charged in court, I have seen copies of the charge sheet in the media and wish to say without any fear of the contradiction that these charges are nothing but a frivolous and politically motivated attempt by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akuffo-Addo and his hatchet man, the Attorney General, to silence me for performing my duties as the Ranking Member on the Finance Committee of the Parliament of Ghana.
“But I want to assure the good people of this country, especially my constituents
who elected me to represent them in Parliament, that I will not and cannot be silenced by the blatant abuse of prosecutorial powers by the Attorney General”.
