The Minority Caucus of the Parliament of Ghana has condemned the arrest and continued detention of Maxwell Kofi Jumah, former Member of Parliament for Asokwa Constituency in the Ashanti Region and former Managing Director of GIHOC Distilleries Company Limited, by operatives of the Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO).
This is contained in a press release dated April 29 and signed by the Minority Leader, Alexander Afenyo-Markin.
“We hold the view that this arrest is politically directed and forms part of a concerted effort to weaponise State institutions against political opponents,” Mr Afneyo-Markin said.
He added that, “This act of political persecution did not arise in a vacuum. On Tuesday, 14th April, 2026, EOCO officers raided Hon. Kofi Jumah’s private residence in Atonsu, Kumasi, while he was not at home. They seized is personal documents including a laptop and keys to his property. No formal charges were communicated to him or his legal representatives. His legal team has publicly described the raid as unlawful and lodged a formal complaint at the Asokwa Divisional Police Command. That raid was a gross violation of the constitutional right to privacy enshrined in Article 18(2) of the 1992 Constitution. It is the context in which his arrest on 28th April, 2026 must be read.
The Minority Leader further stated that, “The pattern of conduct is unmistakable and deliberate: a raid to intimidate; a seizure of personal property to destabilise; and a formal arrest to send a chilling message across the entire NPP. The goal of this Government is to weaken the NPP as a political force capable of holding the Mahama administration accountable. That agenda will fail.
The Minority said it is deeply troubled by the procedural improprieties surrounding this arrest.
“At the time of this statement, EOCO has not clarified the specific charges or legal basis for Hon. Jumah’s arrest and detention, raising serious concerns as to whether the requirements of Article 14(2) of the Constitution, particularly the obligation to promptly inform an arrested person of the reasons for their arrest, have been fully complied with. That silence is itself a cause for concern. This is not the conduct of institutions governed by law. This is the conduct of a Government that has weaponised the machinery of State against its opponents,” he wrote.
According to him, “EOCO’s mandate must be exercised without political direction or partisan bias. That standard, we contend, has not been met here. Meanwhile, real and documented scandals of monumental proportions go uninvestigated. The Ministry of Roads and Highways, under this very Mahama administration, has, as revealed by investigative outlet The Fourth Estate through Right to Information requests, awarded 81 sole sourced contracts worth more than GH₵73 billion within just seven months under the flagship Big Push road programme, with approximately 76% of all contracts awarded between September 2025 and February 2026 bypassing competitive tendering entirely.”
He noted that, “The Minority Caucus does not shield anyone who has genuinely broken the law. We believe fully in the rule of law and due process. But the rule of law cannot be a cudgel wielded against opponents while allies wallow in impunity. Article 296 of the Constitution prohibits the arbitrary exercise of discretionary power. The selective targeting of NPP-affiliated persons, while procurement scandals, conflict-of-interest transactions, and cronyism at the highest levels of the Presidency go unprobed, is the very definition of arbitrary, discriminatory and constitutionally impermissible conduct.”
The Minority therefore demanded the following:
1. The Attorney-General and Minister of Justice to immediately clarify the precise legal basis for Hon. Kofi Jumah’s arrest and the charges, if any, preferred against him, consistent with his right under Article 14(3) to be brought before a court within 48 hours of arrest, or released;
2. The Executive Director of EOCO to publicly account for the legal authority under which his officers entered and searched Hon. Kofi Jumah’s private residence in his absence on 14th April 2026, and for the items seized and removed during that operation;
3. The Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ) to take immediate cognisance of the pattern of politically motivated arrests targeting NPP-affiliated persons, and to initiate an independent inquiry into the selective and partisan deployment of State investigative power, including the failure to investigate the Big Push sole-sourcing scandal and the GoldBod crisis; and
4. The international community and all democracy-watch institutions to take note: Ghana’s democratic institutions are under sustained political pressure from an administration that treats the law as a partisan instrument.
“We stand in full solidarity with Hon. Maxwell Kofi Jumah. We affirm his innocence until due process establishes otherwise before a competent court. We will deploy every constitutional, parliamentary and legal resource at the disposal of the NPP in his defence and in defence of the democratic order,” Mr Afenyo-Markin stated.
