Committee Set Up To Investigate Lauretta Lamptey

COMMENTARY ON THE COMMITTEE SET UP TO INVESTIGATE LAURETTA LAMPTEY'S MALFEASANCE AT CHRAJ 

The stage is set for investigation into alleged acts of malfeasance by the suspended commissioner of CHRAJ, Lauretta Lamptey. This follows the establishment of prima facie case against her by the Chief Justice, Mrs. Georgina Theordora Wood. Subsequently a five member team including two justices of the Supreme Court has been set up to go into the matter. Prima facie is a latin word meaning on the face of it or on the first appearance. Before a prima facie case is established against a respondent, it means sufficient evidence has been adduced to support a claim by the plaintiff. Lauretta Lamptey was accused by one Richard Nyamaah of having abused her office as commissioner of CHRAJ. She was said to have misappropriated about 180 thousand dollars in annual rental charges for a hotel suite that she as CHRAJ Commissioner decided to use as temporal official residence while her owned official residence is being renovated. The question is who decided that Lauretta Lamptey should lodge in a hotel for that number of months when she has official accommodation. 

CHRAJ as an institution is expected to mirror administrative justice and human rights. So when
it is involved in a case of this nature, it raises key issues about our institutions and how they go about performing their mandate. Of course given our path to democracy and we have traversed as a nation since 1992 we are bound to have such difficulties. Nevertheless challenges
such as the Lamptey case can be avoided if appointees or heads of institutions become more aware of their responsibilities and the need to be morally upright. For many years in this country, we have had Chief Executives in public institutions who lived beyond the means of
their organisations. Such practices in the past, in part, explain the collapse of some state institution. Presently such actions cannot be tolerated because the country needs every resource to develop and given the fact that finance is tight in the face of the global economic recession, mismanagement of funds on the scale as Lauretta Lamptey's should not be accepted. Such irresponsible individual actions contribute to giving the government a bad name. No wonder, in the media both Lauretta Lamptey and the Mahama Administration are being hammered. Hopefully, the first step has been taken which is her suspension. What this means is that, the action process has kicked in. The process will be completed with the outcome of findings of the
committee set up by the Chief Justice. We expect the recommendation to set out strict conduct regarding how funds meant for that particular institution are spent and the checks and balances. That should also open a new phase in that institution. Of critical concern however is the need for proper background checks on people chosen for public appointment. This is one way of ensuring that we have the right people in right positions at any given time. Of course, sometimes some may slip through but the greater picture is that as a nation we will save our face if we avoid issues such as madam Lamptey's which gives the nation a bad name needlessly, out of the greed of few individuals.

BY: JUSTICE MINGLE, A JOURNALIST.