Monday, August 24, 2009 (20)
AN Assistant Director of Immigration last Friday told the Accra High Court hearing the nationality trial of the Member of Parliament (MP) for Bawku Central, Adamu Daramani Sakande, that the MP travelled to Ghana on a travel document issued by the British authorities and not on a passport.
Mr Nolasco Nyiedu said the travel document was the type which could be issued to persons seeking asylum.
The witness told the court that the description of the travel document as a passport was, therefore, not correct.
Sakande was on July 31, this year, arraigned before the Accra High Court, charged with nine counts relating to his nationality, perjury, forgery of passport, election fraud, as well as deceiving public officers to be elected as a parliamentarian.
He pleaded not guilty to all the charges and the court, presided over by Mr Justice Charles Quist, admitted him to bail in the sum of GH¢10,000 with a surety.
The MP was also ordered to surrender his Ghanaian passport to the court.
Answering questions under cross-examination from counsel for Sakande, Mr Yonny Kulendi, the witness said the document which described the MP as a Burkinabe could technically be described as a travel document.
He further explained that an asylum seeker could be described as a person whose refugee status was yet to be approved.
Counsel is expected to continue cross-examining Mr Nyiedu on Friday, August 28, 2009.
According to the prosecution, the MP held allegiance to other countries namely the United Kingdom and Burkina Faso.
It said it would lead evidence to show that the accused person fraudulently obtained a Ghanaian passport in order to evade the country’s electoral systems and laws.
Mr Kulendi has described the charges as “politically motivated, baseless and calculated to harass, victimise and ultimately use the altar of justice to criminalise a young Ghanaian who chose to abandon a relatively comfortable life in England to serve his country and his people”.
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