"Sack Barton Odro"

Barely forty-eight hours after Betty Mould Iddrisu, the former Attorney-General and Minister of Justice embroiled in the GH�58 million �Woyomegate� saga tendered in her resignation, calls continue to be made for the deputy Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Barton Odro, to tender in his resignation or be sacked also by President Mills. The latest call was made by Nana Obiri Boahen, in an exclusive interview with the New Statesman yesterday. He contended that Mr Odro�s persistent position that Government had no defence to the claim brought against it by President Mills� bankroller, Alfred Woyome, was an indication that his judgment had been compromised. �I wonder why Barton Odro should still remain in office after exhibiting this level of unprecedented ministerial ineptitude and professional incompetence in his public utterances about the Woyome case. No serious president will keep such a man in his government,� the NPP guru stated. According to the former Minister of State at the Interior Ministry under the erstwhile Kufuor Administration, �Mr Martin Amidu�s amended statement of claim, prior to his dismissal, raised issues of fraud and misrepresentation in the claims brought forth by Mr Woyome.� He explained that the very moment the amendment was filed by his former boss, he ought to have been out of the A-G�s office �because there is no coherence and cohesion in the Attorney General�s office relative to the pursuit of the Woyome case.� Nana Obiri Boahen added that the deputy A-G is of the unrepentant view that the government had a �bad case�, hence the decision of the A-G�s department not to contend the case in court when under the watch of Betty Mould Iddrisu as the A-G. This development, in the view of the former minster of state, represented a clear case of conflict of interest and an indication that he had been compromised in the Woyome saga. �If he has any sense of shame then he must resign. He has exhibited professional incompetence and an unprecedented level of ministerial ineptitude and therefore he is not fit to hold that position�, he insisted. He contended further: �By his statement of �no case� he had compromised the case. If one day, the stand-in A-G cannot continue the case, Mr Barton Odro clearly will not retrieve our money from Mr Woyome. The honourable thing is for him to resign and save the small amount of respect he has left.� Nana Obiri Boahen opined that if President Mills is bent on retrieving the money for Ghana, then he must reshuffle Mr Odro or at best sack him, if he refuses to resign, adding that to keep the deputy A-G in office means the president is seeking to cover up the GHC58m fraud perpetrated against the nation. The silence on the part of the NDC hierarchy, �rented NDC press� and government in demanding the dismissal of the Deputy A-G, in the opinion of Nana Obiri Boahen, shows the presence of a collusion to dupe this nation of her resources. His former boss who came public to state that some of his colleague ministers were orchestrating his dismissal from office to enable them conceal �gargantuan crimes� they had committed against the state was sacked by President Mill for �misconduct.� Betty Mould�s decision to resign has been described, in political circles, as a step taken by President Mills to insulate himself from the fraudulent payments made to the self-professed NDC financier. �Why did it take Betty Mould this long to go? Has President Mills now realised that the cover-up can�t work?� some political analysts have been asking. Martin Amidu was the Attorney General and Minister of Justice at the time President Mills, who was in New York at the time, asked for a report on the Woyome case. �Did that report not say what went wrong, and that the payment was a mistake because no contract existed between the government of Ghana and Mr Woyome? So why did President Mills defend Woyome on Radio Gold after he had received the report?� analysts ask. In the opinion analysts, this development goes to support those who say that judgement debt payments have become just a scheme for the ruling NDC to steal state money.