ECOWAS court okays sack of S/Court Justices

The Community Court of the Economic Community of West African State (ECOWAS) sitting in Abuja Monday upheld the sack of three Justices of the Supreme Court of Ghana.

The trio were; Paul Uuter Dery, Mustapha Habib Logoh and Gilbert Ayisi Addo.

They were among over 30 judges secretly filmed while allegedly accepting bribes in an undercover investigation in 2015 by Anas Aremeyaw Anas, a Ghanaian journalist.

In its judgment, a three-man panel of the court dismissed the suit marked ECW/CCJ/APP/42/16 and filed by the jurists and held that it was unmeritorious.

In the judgment read by Justice Dupe Atoki, the court ruled that the applicants failed to prove that their rights were violated in process leading to the disciplinary actions taken against them by the Ghana Judicial Council.

While acknowledging that the secret filming of the Justices were carried out in their offices without their consent and also amounted to interference with their privacy, the court ruled that the interference was justifiable as it was meant to expose unlawful conduct by public officers.

The panel upheld the argument by the state of Ghana, to the effect that the secret filming of the Justices was supported by Article 1(1) (b) of the Whistle Blower Act of Ghana and Section 61 of the Data Protection Act of Ghana.

It ruled that the applicants’ privacy was interfered with by the secret filming of their activities by Anas, and that the interference, being premised on national legislation, was in compliance with the law.

The court agreed with the state of Ghana that, in engaging in the alleged act of accepting bribe, the applicants ought to know that they would be opened to secret investigation.

The court held that the interference with the applicants’ privacy, aimed at exposing the commission of a crime, was justified and necessary in a democratic society.

By their position as judges, the court held that the applicants were public officers, who received public funds and were, in that capacity, accountable to the public and could be subjected to investigation, where there was reasonable suspicion of their involvement in the commission of a crime.

“The secret recording of the applicants is necessary in a democratic society. The claim to violation of the right to privacy fails,” the court ruled.

Further to this, the court also ruled that the applicants failed to prove their claim that the respondent violated their rights to fair hearing, non-discrimination/equality before the law and right to work.

While two of the applicants failed to respond to the query handed them by the Chief Justice, the court noted that they challenged their suspension and investigation up to the Supreme Court and lost in all the six cases filed by them.

It said, having rightly exercised their right to access the court up to the highest court in Ghana, the applicants cannot claim to have been denied fair hearing.

The Justices were suspended in 2016 by the GJC following which a committee set up by the Chief Justice investigated a petition written against them by Anas and his company, Tiger Eye PI Limited.

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