Here are the plans of the Office of the Special Prosecutor for the next year

Special Prosecutor addresses media

OSP to institute Annual Ghana Corruption League Table from January 2022

Kissi Agyebeng satisfied with response from stakeholders in anti-corruption

In the coming year, the Office of the Special Prosecutor intends to be quite busy.

The Special Prosecutor, Kissi

Read full articleAgyebeng, while addressing the public in his first-ever presser, announced a number of programs lined up to be executed by his office in the year 2022.

He explained, first of all, that he noticed how retrogressively the work of fighting corruption had gone when he took over office a few months ago.

“Upon my assumption of office on 5 August 2021 as the second Special Prosecutor of the Republic, I noticed that the OSP had not been operationalised and it was without its own staff and necessary resources. The fight against corruption had, in effect, been thrown in reverse for three (3) years.

“I immediately triggered the processes to set up and operationalise the Office, to staff it with specialized trained personnel and to fit it with the required material resources and equipment. By so doing, the fight against corruption has been resuscitated and we will carry on the renewed fervour during my tenure in office,” he said.

Kissi Agyebeng also outlined some of the major areas of the job that the OSP will focus on.

“As the institution specifically tasked with taking steps to prevent corruption, I resolve that in the coming year the OSP will institute and strengthen measures to prevent, suppress and repress corruption more efficiently and effectively than has ever been done in this Republic. This should portend hope that Ghana is taking concrete steps to drive down the incidence of corruption.

“From January 2022 the OSP will institute, as part of its pressure-for- progress drive, an Annual Ghana Corruption League Table to assess perceived levels of public sector corruption in the estimation of experts and business people. In aid of this, public agencies would be ranked against each other on a corruption barometer and the results would be publicised every 9 December.

“The OSP would also require all public institutions, departments, agencies, and companies to prepare and submit Integrity Plans intended at assessing deficiencies in their regulations, procedures, policies, guidelines, administration instructions and internal control mechanisms to determine their vulnerability and exposure to corrupt practices and the prescription of curative measures to manage such susceptibility to corruption and corruption-related offences. I am setting up internal control mechanisms to prevent corruption at the OSP itself.

“The OSP would carry out anti-corruption risk assessment and review of all major public contracts, legislation and draft legislation. This is intended to avoid toxic deals and the prevalence of judgment debts and arbitral awards.

“The Office would also undertake continuous education and information of the public and the publicising of detected acts of corruption.

“The OSP would vigorously investigate and prosecute cases of alleged or suspected corruption and corruption-related offences and recover proceeds of such offences through property tracing of tainted property and currency in line with our vision of rendering corruption a costly enterprise,” he outlined.

In the meantime, he explained that his office, in collaboration with a number of stakeholder organizations, are working at ensuring that the overall work of the Office is accomplished, adding that he has received satisfactory responses so far.

“I have commenced engagement with law enforcement and anti-corruption agencies including the Attorney General’s, National Security Secretariat, Ghana Police Service, Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice, Economic and Organised Crime Office, and the Financial Intelligence Centre.

“I have opened insightful interactions and meetings with foreign and diplomatic missions and international organisations in accordance with our mutual legal assistance regime and that of the Convention.

“I have invited the participation and collaboration of anti-corruption civil society, non-governmental and community-based organisations, the media, and investigative journalists to support the work and operations of the OSP in our collective effort in combating corruption. I state with gratification that the response has been enthusiastic,” he said.