The Office of the Attorney General says it has been unable to initiate extradition proceedings against former Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta due to the Office of the Special Prosecutor’s (OSP) failure to release the official docket on the case.
Mr. Ofori-Atta, who is currently residing in the United States, was declared a fugitive from justice by the OSP in February 2025 over alleged involvement in corruption-related activities.
However, months after the announcement, efforts by the Attorney General’s Department to obtain the case file necessary to trigger the extradition process have proved unsuccessful.
Speaking in an interview on GHOne TV, Deputy Attorney-General Dr. Justice Srem Sai revealed that repeated written requests and follow-ups to the OSP over the past two months have yielded no response.
“Mr. Ken Ofori-Atta is a subject of a number of criminal investigations,” Dr. Sai said.
“The Attorney General Office is the authority that can make extradition an investigative docket from the OSP to be able to make this extradition request.”
He explained that the extradition process requires the submission of a complete investigative docket containing evidence and legal grounds before a Ghanaian court can authorize the request to the United States authorities.
“So we have been asking for the dockets for a couple of, I think about two months now, we still do not have the dockets from the OSP and so without the dockets, you cannot go to the American authorities and say, this is the person we want.”
“You cannot go to the American authorities and say, this is the person we want to know. We need to show, because when they are asking for people to be extradited to the United States, they bring the full docket of, as if they are going to court. And then we take that docket to court, for the court to see whether there’s really merit for bringing the person down. We have to do the same thing,” he added.
The OSP had earlier confirmed that investigations into the former minister were ongoing and that a docket had been prepared, but it remains unclear why it has not been forwarded to the Attorney General’s office.
Meanwhile, the stalemate between the two state agencies raises fresh concerns about coordination and communication in the handling of high-profile corruption cases.
Ken Ofori-Atta, who served as Finance Minister under the previous administration, has not publicly responded to the latest developments.
Source: Starrfm.com.gh
