Presidential Spokesperson, Felix Kwakye Ofosu has said the press briefing on Wednesday, June 25 by the suspended Chief Justice Gertrude Torkornoo is “most regrettable.”
Justice Torkornoo in her address insinuated that the processes initiated to remove her from office are politically motivated while declaring that she will not resign from office.
In a quick address shortly to respond to Justice Torkornoo, Kwakye Ofosu dismissed the accusations by the suspended Chief Justice.
He stressed that President Mahama is committed to upholding the rule of law.
“To attempt to cast aspersions on the Presidency is most unfortunate and it undermines what should be a smooth process leading to the determination of the merit or otherwise of the petitions that have been brought.
“In summary, I would say what has happened today (press conference) is most regrettable,” he stated.
Kwakye Ofosu insisted that President Mahama has followed due process as stipulated in Article 146 of the constitution, stating that President Mahama has not taken any personal view or choice in the processes to remove the suspended Chief Justice.
He said the claims of political motive are “unfounded and false.”
“The President has kept fidelity to the Constitution from the beginning.
“Let me place on record without fear of contradiction and let me be clear that no such political agenda has occurred. His Excellency the President took an oath to which he was incidentally sworn by Her Ladyship, the Chief Justice herself and in that the oath he swore to abide by the 1992 constitution.
“Any claim, any inference of a political motive to the President in respect of these processes are unfounded, false and cannot be allowed to stand and I wish to place that on record,” he explained.
Gertrude Torkornoo also noted that her voluntary resignation would mean that she endorses the “unlawful” process for her removal.
“If I resign under these circumstances, I will be saying that this flawed, unknown and opaque possesses acceptable. It is not,” she stated.
In a related development, Kwakye Ofosu also reacted to Torkornoo’s linkage of the killings of some Judges to the Chief Justice’s removal process.
During her press conference, Gertrude Torkornoo noted that the Adu Lodge facility selected for the hearing of the petitions for her removal, featured very prominently in the planning of the murder of Judges on June 30th 1981.
She said this can be read about in the Special Investigative Report on that “terrible event in our national history.”
“It will be recalled that Major Sam Acquah, the military officer who was killed with the three High Court Judges, had been the Director of Human Resources of GIHOC. He was my uncle and my guardian when I entered the University of Ghana in September 1980. I was also living with him at the time he was abducted and murdered. Was Adu Lodge chosen for this inquiry to make me feel insecure? I think so. And I continue to hold the view that there is no reason to hold a quasi-judicial hearing behind the high walls of Adu Lodge,” Torkornoo noted.
But the Presidential Spokesperson emphasised that there is absolutely no linkage of the killings of the Judges to the petition hearing.
Kwakye Ofosu said Torkornoo’s actions are “regrettable and undesirable.”
“The attempts to link the dastardly killings of some Supreme Court Judges and a military officer are most disingenuous. This government and President Mahama has nothing to do with killing of Judges.
“There is absolutely no nexus between the petitions that have been brought and the unfortunate incident in our past and so any effort to link the two is regrettable and should not find space in this discourse,” he stated.
