Cecilia Dapaah case: EOCO has long returned docket to us – OSP reveals

According to the Director of Strategy, Research and Communications at the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP), Samuel Appiah Darko, EOCO has already returned the docket on former Sanitation Minister Cecilia Dapaah’s alleged money laundering case to the OSP.

The OSP has debunked EOCO’s assertion that it has yet to return the docket for the alleged corruption case against the former Sanitation Minister, Cecilia Dapaah.

The Executive Director of EOCO, COP Maame Yaa Tiwa Addo-Danquah, while addressing the media at the 14th Commonwealth Regional Conference of Heads of Anti-corruption Agencies in Africa on Monday, said her outfit intends to return the docket to the OSP because there is nothing to investigate.

“If you read the A-G’s advice, whatever that we would have done had already been directed at the police CID.

And like he said this morning, when you investigate a case and you do not find anything, we should be bold enough to come and tell the public that for this case, even though I suspected this at the day, that wasn’t what came out; we should be bold the Ghanaian,” said COP Addo-Danquah.

But Mr.

Darko, in an interview on Accra-based Citi FM on Tuesday, May 7, noted, amongst other things, that the OSP was surprised to hear the EOCO boss claim it has yet to return the docket because that has already happened.

“Let me start with what EOCO said yesterday [Monday, May 6] that they were going to return the docket to the OSP, that is not accurate.

“They have long returned the docket to us with an explanation that they have been advised by the AG [Attorney General] not to investigate but remember, we did not say to prosecute, [to] investigate and so I don’t understand why EOCO will say they are now going to return the docket to OSP,” he said.

Furthermore, Mr.

Darko refuted the A-G’s assertions that the docket the OSP sent to EOCO was without basis, indicating that EOCO is merely trying to place the responsibility on the OSP rather than showing interest in probing the case further.

“The second point I want to make is this whole idea that the docket that the OSP sent to EOCO was baseless and if you will indulge me, I am going to be a bit detailed, although we are not supposed to do this but our point is that if there is no appetite to want to investigate and prosecute, tell the people of Ghana that there is no appetite but don’t try to put the blame on the OSP,” he noted.

Meanwhile, the Executive Director of Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII), Mary Adda, has bemoaned the lack of communication between the OSP and EOCO regarding the case.

She maintained that the actions of the two anti-graft bodies create the impression that some people are untouchable, saying, “So if we do not want to touch them, we shift the burden to the other.”