{"id":7418,"date":"2024-07-30T11:59:58","date_gmt":"2024-07-30T11:59:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/?p=7418"},"modified":"2024-07-30T12:00:02","modified_gmt":"2024-07-30T12:00:02","slug":"edudzi-thanks-court-of-appeal-judges-for-demonstrating-fidelity-to-the-law-in-acquitting-discharging-ato-forson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/?p=7418","title":{"rendered":"Edudzi thanks Court of Appeal judges for \u2018demonstrating fidelity to the law\u2019 in acquitting &amp; discharging Ato Forson."},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>A member of the Legal team of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) Godwin Edudzi Tameklo has thanked the Court of Appeal judges for acquitting and discharging the Minrooty Leader Dr Cassel Ato Frson in the ambulance trial.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">To him, the judges demonstrated fidelity to the law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">He explained that the Court of Appeal\u2019s decision to uphold the submission of no case in the ambulance trial means the entire trial at the High Court is aborted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cIt means everything has been aborted,\u201d he said<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">He told journalists \u201cI want to thank the distinguished judges that they demonstrated fidelity to the law.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A Court of Appeal\u2019s Court has upheld an appeal on the Financial and Economic Court\u2019s decision by Minority Leader and former Deputy Finance Minister, Dr Cassiel Ato Forson.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<div class=\"ose-youtube ose-uid-48d1bc8004dcef8459a578d56cadbccd ose-embedpress-responsive\" style=\"width:400px; height:400px; max-height:400px; max-width:100%; display:inline-block;\" data-embed-type=\"Youtube\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" allowFullScreen=\"true\" width=\"400\" height=\"400\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/qv7IRnJXU1Q?feature=oembed&color=red&rel=0&controls=1&start=&end=&fs=0&iv_load_policy=0&autoplay=0&mute=0&modestbranding=0&cc_load_policy=1&playsinline=1\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; encrypted-media;accelerometer;autoplay;clipboard-write;gyroscope;picture-in-picture clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen referrerpolicy=\"origin\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The High Court in March 2023 ordered Dr Cassiel Ato Forson to open his defence after the Attorney General\u2019s office established prima facie against the former deputy finance minister in the 2.37 million Euro ambulance case.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Two others, Seth Anemana, a former Chief of Director, Ministry of Health, and Richard Jakpa, a businessman, who were standing trial with Dr Forson were also directed to open defence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Dr. Forson and the two have been variously charged with willfully causing financial loss to the state to the tune of 2.37 million Euros in the purchase of ambulances, which could not be used for their intended performance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Lawyers of Dr Ato Forson filed a submission of no case after the prosecution closed its case but in its ruling on March 30, 2023, presiding judge, Justice Afia Serwah Asare Botwe indicated that the accused persons should open their defence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Court of Appeal in its decision on July 30 indicated that the High Court\u2019s decision should be set aside since \u201cthe prosecution failed to establish sufficient evidence. The trial judge erred in calling on A1(Dr Cassiel Ato Forson) to open his defence. No positively proven facts.<br>\u201cEvidence based on Impermissible speculations.<br>\u201cThere is no link between the evidence heard and what happened for the third accused to be called to open defence.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The panel of three justices also acquitted and discharged the accused persons in the case.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The court also noted in its decision that:<br>\u201cIf there is any financial loss, that was based on the Health Ministry\u2019s recklessness and be blamed on the Ministry of Health. If they worked in the interest of the state the whole ambulance would have been dealt with.<br>\u201cBoth appellants have made a case for them to be acquitted and discharged.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A member of the Legal team of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) Godwin Edudzi Tameklo has thanked the Court of Appeal judges for acquitting and discharging the Minrooty Leader Dr Cassel Ato Frson in the ambulance trial. To him, the judges demonstrated fidelity to the law. He explained that the Court of Appeal\u2019s decision to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7419,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[1924],"class_list":["post-7418","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general-news","tag-godwin-edudzi-tameklo"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7418","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7418"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7418\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7420,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7418\/revisions\/7420"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7419"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7418"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7418"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fishfmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7418"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}