UK Lawyer To Testify For Bawku MP
This was announced by his lawyer, Egbert Faibille, at an Accra Fast Track High Court presided over by Justice Charles Quist yesterday where the MP was expected to open his defence.
Mr. Faibille, who did not mention the name of the said witness, told the court that he would arrive in the country in October with certain relevant documents which would be very useful to their case.
However, the principal state attorney, Rexford Wiredu told the court that once the accused person was around, he could first open his defence so that the said witness would give his evidence when he arrived later. Counsel for the MP said there was no law compelling an accused person to testify first and once the immigration expert was going to be their star witness, they would want him to testify first.
He prayed the court to give his client ample time to prepare himself, as the charges were very serious in nature, adding that the law allows enough time for an accused person to gather all resources at his disposal to defend himself.
The trial judge said he would be on leave by October but adjourned the case to August 23, 2010 for him to decide when the case would be heard. On the last hearing date, Justice Quist dropped six out of nine charges against the MP.
Nevertheless, he said, the MP had a case to answer on three charges of false declaration of office, perjury and deceiving a public officer, saying the prosecution had been able to lay the necessary foundation, for which reason he would have to open his defence.
The judge noted that the first charge of prohibited immigrant could not hold because the accused person is a Ghanaian and there was no evidence before him that he acquired it through any illegal means.
The judge noted that that the constitution of Ghana allowed dual citizenship so the MP could not have been a prohibited immigrant and dropped that charge against him. On the charge of forgery of passport, the judge noted that there was equally nothing on his passport to show that it was illegally acquired and noted that he had no case to answer on that.
Furthermore, on the false declaration of passport, Justice Quist said that the prosecution had led enough evidence to prove that the MP had falsely declared he did not owe allegiance to any country by swearing an oath on October 14 2008, when he knew that he was a British citizen.
According to the judge, when the prosecution sought to verify whether or not the MP, who is a security management specialist, was a British national, the British High Commission said the passport number of the accused person was that of a British citizen.
He said that evidence presented by the prosecution showed that his British passport would expire in 2014, so he had a case to answer. On the forth charge perjury, he said the MP had a case to answer on that since he had committed perjury by lying on oath about his citizenship.
He said by having multiple citizenships, he should open his defence in a case in which he has been accused of citizenship fraud.
Earlier, counsel for the MP wanted a submission of no case and said that the prosecution team had so far failed to prove that he was indeed a British citizen, at the time he stood for parliamentary elections. According to him, after listening to the prosecution, he had come to the conclusion that they had not been able to prove any case against the MP for which he should open his defence.