Former Sports Minister jailed for contempt over land

If paid, the court presided over by Justice Afia Serwah Asare-Botwe, ordered that GH¢5,000 out of the fine should be paid to Kofi Ammoah Kwafo, the man, who ini­tiated the contempt application against Dr Ahmed, the Chief of Defence Staff and the Director-General of Logistics of the Ghana Armed Forces (GAF).

Justice Asare-Botwe, who is a Court of Appeal judge, sitting with additional re­sponsibility as a High Court judge, noted in her judgement that both Chief of Defence Staff and the Director-General of Logistics were not personally served with copies of the court land litigation judgement of 2019.

For instance, the applicant argued that the first respondent, purportedly disposed of the property to the GAF, in 2017, which document was executed in 2018 and the ap­plication for registration, therefore, having been made in 2021 when the judgement of the court was already handed down.

Mr Kwafo said that the officers of the GAF were in contempt of court when they resisted the execution of the judgement of the court.

Fynn, in his written submission, stated that his client cannot be found to be in con­tempt since no evidence had been canvassed to show that he had fallen in breach of any order, direction or judgement of the court to merit such action.

He denied having backdated the assign­ment of the sub-matter to the GAF or any other allegation of fraud and stated that, this was a ploy to enforce the judgement handed down by the court by a means other than what was prescribed by the rules of court.

The former minister stated that the applicant was deploying an incompetent process in bringing the application to incite the court against him and the other respon­dents.