An Accra High Court has dismissed a report by the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ) which made some adverse findings against the former CEO of the Public Procurement Authority, Adjenim Boateng Adjei.
Presiding judge Audrey Kocuvie-Tay ruled that CHRAJ breached the fair hearing rule by substituting parts of the complaint that was filed by antigraft campaigners, Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII) with its (CHRAJ) own allegations.
The Court also concluded that CHRAJ failed to give the applicant (A.B. Adjei) the chance to cross-examine the witnesses called during their investigations before reaching their conclusions.
The Court also held that CHRAJ failed to investigate the substantive complaints made by the complainant but rather, the Commission focused on matters that were not part of the submissions of the GII, the complainant in the case.
Following an investigative exposé by Manasseh Azure Awuni in 2019 entitled “Contract for Sale”, the Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII) petitioned the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ) to investigate chief executive officer (CEO) of the Public Procurement Authority (PPA) Adjenim Boateng Adjei and other Members of the Board of the PPA to find out if they have been involved in corruption, conflict of interest, collusion and inappropriate conduct in violation of the Constitution and laws of Ghana for which appropriate sanctions should be applied.
Ghana Integrity Initiative requested CHRAJ to investigate the following six issues:
– “Mr. Adjenim Boateng Adjei and other members of the Board of the PPA have allegedly been in involved in corruption, conflict of interest, collusion, and in appropriate conduct in violation of the Constitution and the laws of Ghana”
-“on the face of the documents (evidence) that the complainant (GII) received and reviewed, Mr Adjenim Boateng Adjei established companies soon after he was appointed Chief Executive Officer of PPA without disclosing his interest”.
– “after establishing the companies, Mr Adjenim Boateng Adjei used his public office for private gain”.
– “in order to facilitate his companies win contracts, Mr. Adjenim Boateng Adjei either directly or indirectly disclosed procurement-related information to his companies unlawfully and, among others, enabled a company less than three years old to win high value contracts”.
-“the companies that Mr Adjenim Boateng Adjei established, allegedly subletted, subcontracted or “sold” contracts awarded by them by the procurement entities of the State without the consent of the said entities”.
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