The Member of Parliament (MP) for North Tongu, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa says the ongoing trial of some three National Democratic Congress legislators is a clear case of “political witch hunt and judicial manipulation” for which reason the caucus will continue to boycott sittings of Parliament to stand by their colleagues in court.
The three MPs are Dr Cassiel Ato Forson, the Minority Leader and MP for Ajumako Enyan Essiam; James Gyakye Quayson, the MP for Assin North and Collins Dauda, MP for Asutifi South.
Mr Ablakwa’s comments follow the boycotting of Thursday’s sitting by the Minority in Parliament to accompany and solidarise with two members of the caucus.
He said this in an interview on Eyewitness News on Citi FM in Accra on Thursday.
Dr Ato Forson is currently facing a criminal case related to an alleged financial loss of €2.37 million to the state. The case revolves around a deal to purchase 200 ambulances between 2014 and 2016.
On the other hand, James Gyakye Quayson is undergoing trial at the High Court in Accra for charges of forgery and perjury. These charges are in connection to alleged offences during the lead-up to the 2020 Assin North parliamentary election.
For Dauda, he together with four others have been slapped with 72 counts of willfully causing financial loss to the state, misapplying public property, issuing false certificates, and dishonestly causing loss to public property.
“We are clear in our minds that what is going on with the case of James Gyakye Quayson, Ato Forson, and Collins Dauda is nothing but a political witch hunt and that is why the Minority Leader announced that we are no longer going to cooperate with parliamentary business. Unfortunately, we will have to suffer because we want to stand up to the tyranny, to the oppressor.”
“We don’t want to just sit back and just watch our colleagues being sent to the slaughterhouse helplessly. We want to rise up in solidarity and point out to the whole world that we now see clearly the political witchcraft going on. The clear abuse of power, manipulation of the judicial process and we are not going to tolerate that,” Mr Ablakwa stated.
“And you see we are guided by precedence. The irony is that the lawyer of Gyakye Quayson has been a victim of this before. I refer to Tsatsu Tsikata who has been able to live to tell the story. Indeed, he has gone back to the Supreme Court and indeed the records show that what happened to him was a travesty of justice and has expunged that. He has been totally acquitted,” Mr Ablakwa said.
He indicated that they had come to that conclusion because of the president’s admonishing to the people of Assin North not to vote for Mr Quayson as he was likely to be a jailbird.
“For those who thought that the ongoing persecution was not persecution but prosecution and that it will be a fair trial that the charges have merit and that it is not a kangaroo process, all those people have been left with a very rude awakening that indeed what is going on is nothing but witch hunting and clear manipulation of the judiciary,” he added.
