Saturday, August 1, 2009 (Page 3)
THE Member of Parliament (MP) for Bawku Central, Adamu Daramani, was yesterday arraigned before the Accra High Court, charged on 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 accused person was also ordered to surrender his Ghanaian passport to the court by next Monday, while the matter was adjourned to August 11, 2009 for hearing.
The MP, who wore a cream-coloured suit, was cheered on by a huge crowd which thronged the court premises to give him moral support. The crowd chanted “Allahu Akbar”, meaning “Allah is Great”, when he emerged out of the courtroom.
The case of the prosecution is that the accused person is not a Ghanaian and does not qualify to be elected as an MP because he also holds Burkinabe and United Kingdom passports, on which he had travelled to Ghana.
It said he never renounced his nationality of those countries before he presented himself to be nominated and elected as a parliamentarian in the December 2008 elections.
According to the charge sheet, as presented to the court by Ms Getrude Aikins, the acting Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), the accused person, who is also a security management specialist, did enter the country on December 20, 2007.
Furthermore, the accused person, in Bawku on October 15, 2008, in order to qualify as a parliamentarian, did falsely make a statutory declaration to enable him to qualify to act in that office, while on October 15, 2008 he swore a statutory declaration that he was a citizen of Ghana.
He is also alleged to have deceived a public officer when, on October 15, 2008, with intent to facilitate obtaining an appointment, he did deceive a public officer acting in the execution of a public office or duty and also before the 2008 elections he made a false statement in an application to have his name included in the voters register.
The accused is alleged to have taken part to register as a voter when the voters register was opened and subsequently went ahead to vote in the December 7, 2008 general election when he was not entitled to do so.
Ms Aikins told the court that information reaching the complainant in the case, Mr Sumaila Biebel, a cattle dealer and native of Bawku, indicated that the accused person was a Burkinabe, British and Ghanaian.
According to the prosecution, the complainant, as part of his civic responsibility, reported the matter to the authorities and investigations revealed that the accused person had a penchant for the acquisition of multiple nationalities.
It said investigations revealed that the MP had a Burkinabe passport, numbered C10098625, which was issued in November 1999 and was expected to expire in November 2009.
The prosecution further pointed out that the accused person travelled to Ghana on the said passport on March 19, 2004 and departed on March 30, 2004.
It said the prosecution would lead evidence to show that the MP wielded a British passport, with number 094442659, on which he travelled to Ghana on December 13, 2005, after he had sought and obtained an entry visa from the Ghana High Commission in London.
“Strangely enough, when the accused was returning to Ghana in 2007, he had managed to get a Ghanaian passport, although he was still then, as now, a Burkinabe/British citizen,” Ms Aikins pointed out.
The prosecution further told the court that the MP held allegiance to other countries, adding that 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.
“The accused person is an alien twice over. He deceived electoral officers on the misrepresentation that he was a Ghanaian and on the same misrepresentation he got constituents to nominate him and his party to accept him for election, believing him to be Ghanaian,” the prosecution pointed out.
Lead counsel, Mr Yonni Kulendi, prayed the court to admit the accused person to a self-recognisance bail in view of the fact that he was a sitting parliamentarian who would make himself available to answer the charges.
Counsel said there was no way that his client would run away or interfere with investigations into the matter, since, when he heard that there was a criminal process against him, the accused himself called the DPP to inform her that he was ready to receive the summons himself.
The court initially doubted whether the accused person would avail himself to the court, in view of the fact that he held other passports, but counsel argued that those were allegations which had not yet been proved.
Mr Kulendi described the charges as politically motivated and baseless, 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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