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Judgement debt payment delay costs state GH¢60,052

The state ended up paying GH¢60,052 in 2008 to a retired worker of the Ghana Mission in London as a result of accumulated interest, due to the delay in settling a GH¢16,000 judgement debt in 2006.

The beneficiary, Mr James Manu, who was given a retirement benefit of £10,463.17, was not satisfied with the package and proceeded to a London court to sue the mission. However, the mission pleaded immunity, which was granted by the court.

The plaintiff then came down to Ghana and resurrected the case in the High Court. As a nominal defendant, the Attorney General’s Department entered appearance and filed a defence.

The Attorney General’s Department was given a period to file discoveries (production of documents related to the case).

This the department did not do timeously and Mr Manu applied to the court for the setting aside of the defence of the Attorney General, which was granted. Consequently Mr Manu, who retired in 1999, was granted reliefs in the sum of GH¢16,000 in 2006.

Interest calculated on the amount came to GH¢20,000. The amount was not paid immediately.

The first tranche was paid in 2007, while the second was paid in 2008. Because of time lapse, the GH¢16,000 rose to GH¢60,000.

Counsel for the commission, Mr Dometi Kofi Sokpor, made this known to journalists at its sitting in Accra yesterday.

 

Chief State Attorney

Taking her turn at the sitting, a Chief State Attorney, Ms Dorothy Afriyie Ansah, told the commission that after judgement had been given in favour of the plaintiff, there were meetings to try to negotiate the interest down.

According to her, the final amount of GH¢60,052 would have been bigger if it had not been for the negotiations.

The Chief State Attorney said she was indeed aware of the case involving Mr Manu and the Attorney General and the payment of £10,463.17 and GH¢60,052 to the plaintiff.

She said before the first payment (10,463,17 pounds) was made to the plaintiff, the AG’s Department wrote to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to verify the payment, after which it forwarded a copy of the writ of the plaintiff to the ministry for its comments.

“Documents that were requested were also forwarded to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and their comments to us confirmed that that amount of money had been paid to the plaintiff,” she said, adding that Mr Manu went to court after he had been paid the £10,000 in London.

Ms Ansah said comments from the ministry indicated that the £10,000 paid to the plaintiff was the final amount he (plaintiff) was entitled to.

Following the writ filed by the plaintiff, she said, a defence was filed.

Asked by Mr Sokpor whether the case went through a full trial, she replied in the negative and explained that “we were unable to meet the deadline for discoveries due to the long procedure that we had to go through”.

“The plaintiff wrote to the court to set aside our defence and got judgement,” she said.

 

Ministry of Food and Agriculture

The Director of the Legal Unit of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, Mr Seth Mensah Dumoga, who appeared in the matter involving African Automobile Limited and the ministry, said the ministry could not locate any document that showed that it was indebted to the AAL.

By Emmanuel Bonney/Daily Graphic/Ghana

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