Atta Akyea disputes Amidu’s ‘adult child’ opinion

The Member of Parliament (MP) of Akim Abuakwa South and Minister for Works and Housing, Mr Samuel Atta Akyea, has disputed a claim by the Special Prosecutor nominee, Mr Martin Amidu that because his offspring have attained adulthood, they no longer hold as his children.

Atta Akyea says Mr. Amidu cannot proffer an opinion on who a child is as it is a stated case of the law that one’s offspring, whether aged 80 or more and remains the biological offspring of another, remains that person’s child.

Mr Amidu in his responses before the Appointments Committee of Parliament when he is being vetted for the newly created post of Special Prosecutor, had indicated he had three offspring aged 39, 41 and 43, refusing to call them his ‘children’ on the basis that they all have attained adult suffrage towards whom he bears no responsibility.

Explaining his position, Amidu said it was his personal opinion, and added that it is just as there are as many opinions as there are human beings.

They are adults, he insisted, and explained that he does not seek to disown them per his position but to explain that even though they are his blood and he would do team up to do anything legitimate with them, he refuses to call them children, because they are not and he has no controls over them.

But commenting on Mr Amidu’s position, Mr Atta Akyea disagreed with the SP nominee and said by the SP nominee’s posture, he was trying to change the country’s succession inheritance law.

According to Mr Atta Akyea, irrespective of the fact that Mr Amidu’s children are grown-ups, they are still his children and therefore can be described as his “children”.