Cecilia Dapaah Saga It Is Corruption For EOCO To Say Nothing Wrong With Incident Cletus Avoka

A Former Majority Leader of Ghana’s parliament and Member of Parliament for Zebilla East constituency, Hon. Cletus Avoka, believes it is an "act of corruption" for the Economic and Organized Crime Office (EOCO) to say "there was nothing wrong" with the Cecilia Dapaah’s case.

To him, the conduct of EOCO relative to the alleged money laundering case involving the former Sanitation Minister, Madam Cecelia Dapaah leaves much to be desire and smacks of a distortion of justice.

Speaking on Accra based Joy FM, monitored by , the former Interior Minister and lawyer, “It is corruption for EOCO to say that there was nothing wrong with the incident. I think the government must do more about this incident. Frankly speaking, EOCO’s treatment of Cecilia Dapaah’s case is a travesty of justice.”

He therefore wants Madam Cecelia Dapaah to be subjected to thorough investigation emphasisng that, the process of investigation must be void of bias or any form preferential treatment.

It is recalled that, EOCO, after seeking advice from the office of the Attorney General and Minister for Justice, decided to transfer the docket it had received from the office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) to investigate an alleged money laundering case.

This decision by EOCO had resulted in a public outburst over what they perceive to be an attempt to shield a seeming act of corruption. This led some prominent Ghanaians including Daniel Yaw Domelevo, former Auditor-General, lawyer Martin Kpebu, private a legal practitioner, Dr. Adam Bona, a security analyst and Political Science lecturer, Prof. Ransofrd Gyampo, to petition Parliament requesting for a bipartisan probe into the conduct of EOCO.

The group argues that EOCO had more than enough basis to investigate the former Minister for money laundering as she has been inconsistent and unable to provide the source of the huge amount of money seized at her residence by the Special Prosecutor.

Portion of the petition to parliament by the group reads, “The failure to explain the source of the money should have been the cornerstone of the investigation.”

It also raised concerns about what the group described as the deliberate refusal by EOCO to take steps to protect the money which was seized from the residence of the former minister by the OSP.

“Upon receipt of the docket, EOCO did not act timeously to seize the money that the OSP was returning to Madam Cecelia Dapaa as publicly stated by the OSP”.

The petition also accused EOCO of being inconsistent with their public commentary and actions in the investigation.

Hon. Cletus Avoka urged the various anti-corruption agencies to work assiduously in investigating the case of money laundeering or any related act of corruption.Kobina Darlington/