General News of Monday, 3 May 2021

Source: www.ghanaweb.com

‘It’s not everything you must dignify with a response’ – Gabby tells critics

Gabby Asare Otchere-Darko, Member of NPP Gabby Asare Otchere-Darko, Member of NPP

Asaase Radio kingpin Gabby Asare Otchere-Darko has said in response to former Special Prosecutor (SP) Martin Amidu’s comment on the new SP’s appointment: “It is not everything said about you that must be dignified with a response...”

Otchere-Darko’s response was posted on his verified Twitter timeline on Friday, April 30.

Otchere-Darko’s response comes after the former Special Prosecutor, Martin Amidu, wrote that the former used his radio station to prepare the minds of Ghanaians to accept Kissi Agyebeng, who is Gabby and the Attorney-General’s surrogate, as the Special Prosecutor.

Amidu in his three-page statement said that the move is to protect Gabby and Attorney General Godfred Yeboah Dame’s interests in the controversial Agyapa Minerals Royalties Transaction.

Amidu indicated that Asaase Radio, through propaganda and a defamatory news publication in respect of his resignation and the subsequent announcement of Kissi Agyebeng as the new Special Prosecutor averred:

“His [Martin Amidu] reasons for resigning were roundly criticized by civil society actors, who maintained that the law offered him enough protection to stay in office and perform his duties without interference and that there was no clear evidence of any executive interference that should have triggered his resignation.”

But Amidu argues, “Asaase Radio and its alter ego did not have the courage to point out one civil society actor who expressed the fabrication it was putting out to the public to aid the appointment of its new surrogate and preferred ‘Agyapa’ Special Prosecutor.

"Asaase Radio also shamefully pretended not to have read my rejoinder giving further and better particulars on my resignation dated 26th November 2020 to the Secretary to the President’s supposed to reply to my resignation letter which we now know by experience that the President might not have instructed to be written at all. My functions or my judgement and decision as the Special Prosecutor to resign my office under Act 959 was not subject to the supervision or judgement of civil society actors let alone those of them who secretly attend Government policy-making meetings as I had occasion to point out in writing previously.”

Martin Amidu further stated that Gabby’s radio station in the exercise of its brazen impunity reported a matter that was not part of the reasons he resigned as the Special Prosecutor, all in an attempt as “propaganda to facilitate and enhance the status of its surrogate ‘Agyapa’ Special Prosecutor even before the President could indicate his acceptance of the nominee and forward a request to Parliament.”

Amidu also questions why the nomination of Kissi Agyebeng as the Special Prosecutor was made known to the media in a letter solely addressed to the President.

“How then did the nomination letter of a new Special Prosecutor come into the public domain to make the rounds in the press?” he asked.

In spite of these weighty matters, Gabby thinks Amidu does not merit a response.