Legal practitioner Martin Kpebu says the corruption case against the Chief Executive Officer of the Public Procurement Authority (PPA) seemed to have been blown beyond proportion.
To him, he wants to know whether the actions of suspended Adjenim Boateng Adjei affected the public purse or not.
“That was what I am looking at and I haven’t found it [yet],” he said on The Key Points on TV3 and 3FM on Saturday, August 31.
He said many public servants will fail the test of conflict of interest as per the country’s procurement laws and so the criticism must be toned down.
This comes a couple of days after the beleaguered Chief Executive Officer broke his silence on the case, accusing the public of seeking to crucify him for no wrongdoing.
“The public is simply speaking words of untruth,” he told TV3’s Komla Klutse after his first meeting with the Special Prosecutor on Thursday.
“I regret the way I’m being crucified for doing nothing.”
Mr Kpebu appeared to support the suspended CEO, saying even in the documentary that led to his suspension by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, AB Adjei lost some of the contracts he bid for despite his interests.
“What I am interested in seeing is that, was there a loss to the public purse?”
But also on the programme was Dr Ahmed Jinapor, a Senior Lecturer at the University of Education, Winneba (UEW), who opined that the law may be “technical” to exonerate the embattled government appointee but “in the face of the public, Mr Adjei is guilty”.
He said time should be allowed to make the law take its course despite expressing disagreement with the self-recognisance bail granted him by the Office of the Special Prosecutor.
AB Adjei was suspended after an investigative documentary by freelance journalist Manasseh Azure Awuni revealed that a company he co-owns sells government contracts it won through single-source and restrictive tendering to the highest bidder.
After suspending him, President Akufo-Addo directed the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ) and the OSP to further investigate Mr Adjei on corruption and possible case of conflict of interest.
By Emmanuel Kwame Amoh|3news.com|Ghana