President Mahama did not direct me to discontinue cases – Ayine

The Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Dominic Ayine, has denied claims that President John Mahama instructed him to discontinue some high-profile cases.

Addressing the media on Wednesday, February 12, Dr Ayine took full responsibility for dropping the cases.

He said, he took the decision after a critical examination of all the cases and consulting widely.

Dr Ayine added that evidence adduced in these cases fell short of what was required to convict the accused persons.

The Minister of Justice noted that for these reasons, he found it needless and a “waste of state resources” to continue with the cases.

“…no new evidence has been provided to me since I assumed office as Attorney-General to cause me to abandon my professional convictions,” he stated.

“The second reason why I dropped some of the charges on the above case is that the charges were defective and upon careful scrutiny were filed against the prompting of plain common sense,” Dr. Ayine remarked.

Since assuming office, the Attorney-General has discontinued seven cases against some public officials.

The cases he discontinued include that of the former Deputy Governor of the Bank of Ghana, now acting Governor, Johnson Asiama. The Attorney-General withdrew all charges against him after he was implicated in the collapse of UniBank and UT Bank.

The AG also dropped the case brought against former Minority Leader and now Finance Minister Ato Forson and Richard Jakpa in the ambulance procurement deal.