Juduciary is corrupt -Dr Atuguba reiterates
Dr Raymond Atuguba, a constitutional lawyer and
Executive Secretary of the Constitutional Review Committee has reiterated his
comments about the judiciary being the most corrupt institution in the country.
According to the lawyer, “the greatest threat to
Ghana’s infant democracy is the judiciary.”
He made these remarks when he hosted by Rashida
Nasamu on e.tv Ghana’s flagship programme, Awake.
Dr Atuguba who was nearly “lynched” by colleague in
the judicial fraternity for some comments he made on one local radio station,
Joy FM, accused the radio station for misconstruing his comments about the judiciary.
JOY FM’S UNFAIRNESS
According to Dr Atuguba, his comments on Joy FM were
misconstrued.
He said, “What Joy FM did was a dangerous thing.
What they did was to take a tape of three and half hours to four hours and then
cut bits and pieces and join them up.”
However, the lawyer did not sue the radio station,
which he according to him “would be a waste of money since we all know the
truth that there is corruption in the judiciary. And so if against your own
intentions that fact is made public and it is the truth you don’t oppose it.”
CLEANSING GHANA’S JUDICIARY AND VICTIMIZATION
Dr Atuguba bemoaned the level of corruption in the
judiciary saying that they receive lump sums of money exempt of tax after
retiring.
He also mentioned that there were a million of ways
to improve the judiciary.
He said, “There are a million ways to improve the
judiciary. Luckily so many countries have beaten that path and there are many
lessons to learn from it. And if we wanted to change it we could change it.”
According to Dr Atuguba, when he was accused of
accusing the judiciary of being corrupt, he spent almost eight months receiving
complains and documentations which demonstrated clearly that there was a lot of
corruption in the judiciary.
He said he had to secure some of those documents
since people started observing his movements and the kind of “intelligence work”
he was doing.
He said “When these accusations were laid bare, I
had to spend the next 8 months receiving complains, documentations which
demonstrated clearly that there was a lot of corruption in the judiciary. Some
of which I had to secure and my office has been raided three times since then.”
Following the comments
he made about judicial corruption, Dr Atuguba was banned by the Association of
Magistrates and Judges of Ghana (AMJG), along with three other lawyers, David
Annan, Abraham Amaliba and the late Mr Larry Nimi, for alleged unprofessional
behaviour. The ban has since been lifted.
Jasmine Arku / etvghana.com
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