General News of Saturday, 5 October 2019

Source: www.ghanaweb.com

GH¢180m budget allocated to my office hasn’t hit my account – Amidu to Otchere Darko

Special Prosecutor Martin Amidu play videoSpecial Prosecutor Martin Amidu

Pursuant to revelations by leading member of the NPP, Gabby Otchere Darko in response to the Special Prosecutor on the latter’s office being the largest benefactor of the 2019 budget allocation, Mr. Amidu has said his outfit is yet to receive such.

Mr. Otchere Darko without citing evidence posted on his Facebook wall that under the Ministries, Departments and Agencies section, the Special Prosecutor’s office was allocated a sum of GHS 180,160,231 from the 2019 budget; the highest in the category to fight corruption in the country.

He added the Ministry of Justice and Attorney General’s Department with GHS 135,983,714, made the second most allocated, while the Commission for Human Rights and Justice was the third-highest acquiring GHS 31,948,070.

Although checks by www.ghanaweb.com confirmed the claims by the close relation to President Akufo-Addo to be true, Mr. Martin Amidu rubbished it lamenting that his outfit was yet to receive the supposed money.

“You say you have given GH¢180 million. I cannot access the GH¢180 million because as we speak today, my office has not been classified for procurement purposes. So I cannot procure cars myself, I cannot procure equipment myself. I can procure nothing,” the Special Prosecutor charged.

According to the head of the independent prosecution unit, among other things, his outfit is heavily under-resourced, thus, causing him to function at a snail pace.



Martin Amidu has come under heavy criticism by stakeholders and Ghanaians as a whole over his failure to deliver his mandate by successfully prosecuting corrupt officials, a year and a half into office.

Parliament passed a law in November 2017 to establish the Office of the Special Prosecutor as a specialized and independent entity to investigate specific cases of corruption, involving public officers and individuals in the private sector implicated but Ghanaians are yet to see this come into fruition.