The Executive Director for the Center for Democratic Development (CDD), Professor Emmanuel Gyimah-Boadi says the Commissioner for the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ) should be impeached.
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"Impeach The CHRAJ Commissioner" - Professor Emmanuel Gyimah-Boadi
According to him, after all the embarrassment Ms. Lauretta Vivian Lamptey has caused a very respectable institution such as CHRAJ, she should not still be in office.
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The CHRAJ boss has been staying at the Best Western Premier Hotel since August this year at a cost of $450 (1,400 cedis) per day to the state while renovation of her official residence has stalled since 2011. Her accommodation alone has cost the state some GH¢160,000 in three months.
He noted that, CHRAJ has for some time now been bedeviled by a streak of infractions and misadventures and wondered why the boss of the human rights’ body is still at post.
“Why is this official still keeping her job for all the embarrassment she’s caused to herself, for the embarrassment she’s caused to a very important institution of state and one of the key institutions of democratic governance we have in Ghana today, why is she still keeping the office," he stated.
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He attributed the unfortunate development to an age-old attitude of public officials not resigning voluntarily when necessary.
Public officers "don’t resign voluntarily even on the grounds of ill-health let alone on grounds of embarrassment and professional misconduct,” Prof Gyimah-Boadi noted.
He stressed if those in authority are failing to fire her, “citizens should get into a process that will end in her departure from office with all the ignominy that she has piled on the institution.”
With two petitions to the president demanding Ms. Lamptey's removal from office, the CDD boss said the CHRAJ boss can be impeached and an “impeachment will give her the opportunity to defend herself and I believe that in any rational, normal impeachment process, she will not end up keeping her job.”
He, however, warned that “what we don’t want is the president to unilaterally and arbitrarily fire the head of an independent constitutional body, no.”
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“Just that there are processes for conducting an impeachment against an officer at this level against whom all these allegations have been made, all these allegations have come and who on top of it all appears totally unrepentant, impeachment is the way to go not firing,” Prof Gyimah-Boadi added.
Asked if CHRAJ should start the impeachment process, he said the judiciary ought to do that but he is not completely conversant with the specific processes involved.
The CDD boss “I have no doubt in my mind that there is a proper procedure for getting rid of such an unworthy official of state.”
Lauretta Vivian Lamptey’s dismissal, he concluded, does not require the filing of a petition and that “just on the basis of what she has said on record to the media in her own voice, she should be somewhere else other than in this job.”
H/T: MyJoyOnline
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