The Vice President of IMANI Africa, Kofi Bentil says the charges leveled against the former Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta by the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) are not serious.
Speaking on the Key Points current affairs programme on TV 3 on Saturday 17 January 2026, the legal practitioner added that any prosecutor who slams 78 charges on an accused person is not serious.
“I have said publicly that any prosecutor who charges in a high-profile case like this with over seventy-eight charges is not serious.”
“I don’t think the charges are serious. Making bad decisions in government is not a crime unless we can prove that you made decisions to profit yourself corruptly, caused financial loss to the state or you had intentions” Kofi Bentil stated.
Bentil noted that it is easier to extradite a convicted criminal than someone who has not been charged at all. He echoed his earlier suggestion for Ken Ofori-Atta to be charged and trialed in absentia because the law allows that just like it was done in the case of Sedina Tamakloe.
He buttressed the assertion that the embattled former Finance Minister would love to return to Ghana to answer to the allegations leveled against him but is apprehensive as to how he would be treated upon his return.
“I know that Ken will love to come back but he is apprehensive of how he will be treated because of the kinds of things that have been said and done in the past one year” he iterated.
In all, there are 78 counts of corruption and corruption-related offences officially slammed on former Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta, Strategic Mobilisation Limited (SML), and six others by the Office of the Special Prosecutor.
The former Finance Minister is scheduled to be heard in a US court on Tuesday, January 20, 2026 after the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) published details of his detention on its website, confirming that he was being held in an ICE Custody at the Caroline Detention Facility in Virginia.
ICE has described Mr. Ofori-Atta as an ‘illegal alien’ who has overstayed his permitted period in the United States and may face extradition in the coming days.
By Samuel Afriyie Owusu
