Special Prosecutor Kissi Agyebeng has expressed concerns that Ghana is not fully committed to fighting corruption, citing public attitudes and resistance to anti-corruption efforts.
Speaking at the Constitution Day Public Lecture, Agyebeng highlighted the contradictions in the public’s response to corruption enforcement. “There have been attempts to discredit the principles of the office and its officers, unjustly attended by formidable resistance and push back,” he stated.
“Often the attacks on the office and its principals are done by persons who are at the short end of investigation or prosecution, and the associates of such persons.”
Agyebeng noted that these challenges have significant implications for the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP).
“The effect of the existential challenge confronting the OSP is that though the nation collectively acknowledges that we must fight corruption, yet there is also a section that the flagship agency designed, even if imperfectly, to fight corruption, is not needed and should be disbanded while others actively undermine it and its principal officers,” he said.
Agyebeng described this paradox as a “curious cycle,” where the public protests both when the OSP takes action and when it is perceived as inactive.
“This has translated into a rather curious cycle; there is an outcry when the OSP acts and an outcry when it is seen as not acting. It is as if we do not know what we want. The situation in Ghana now appears to be like ‘we must fight corruption but we must not fight corruption, that is our state now,'” Agyebeng added, emphasizing the need for a collective commitment to fighting corruption.