Gloria Akufo – Attorney General
An Accra High Court has granted an injunction against officials of the Ghana Football Association (GFA), thereby paving the way for the Registrar General to be appointed the official liquidator of the local football governing body.
The Attorney General, Gloria Akuffo, went to court with a firm plan to liquidate the GFA because, according to her, the Association in its current state is not fit for the purpose for which it was established.
The plan to liquidate the GFA was contained in a petition filed by the Attorney-General, acting on behalf of the government, last month at the High Court for the dissolution of the GFA.
Deputy Attorney-General, Godfred Dame, told Joy News’ Joseph Ackah-Blay after the ruling on Thursday, that the government is at this point awaiting the conclusion of police investigations to take criminal action against some officials of the GFA.
The Registrar General, Mrs. Jemima Oware, is to take custody of GFA assets to prevent officials of the football governing body from dissipating it,” Joseph reports from the court.
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“The court presided over by Justice Samuel Asiedu has also placed an injunction on all officials of the football governing body from holding themselves as such,” Joseph recounts.
Joseph Ackah-Blay in Court
Lawyers for the GFA, led by Thaddeus Sory, opposed the application.
Mr. Sory told the court no member of the Association had been found guilty by any court of competent jurisdiction for committing a crime.
Godfred Dame countered that the law allows that once a Director of the Company had been served, the company had been notified.
He questioned why the A-G’s Department was not interested in initiating criminal proceedings against the officials of the GFA captured in the documentary by Investigative journalist Anas Aremeyaw Anas as had been done in the past.
He maintained the relief the A-G was seeking was not appropriately before the court as the members and officials of the GFA had not been individually served with the application.
Background
Government had been praying the court to make the Registrar General’s Department, the legal liquidator in the process to bring the GFA’s existence to an end.
In her argument before the court, the A-G said the GFA was being used for illegal purposes, hence the government’s decision to protect the interest of the public.
She added that GFA officials have used the Association for some corrupt activities as captured in the 2014 World Cup Dzamefe Commission Report and a documentary by Anas Aremeyaw Anas, an undercover investigative journalist.
“We are asking that the court should order that the Registrar General as the legal liquidator be asked to take over,” Ms Akuffo told journalists after securing an interim injunction on the activities of the GFA on Tuesday, June 12.
“That will be the body that will see to the future of the establishment of the administration this FA. So we are not just throwing away the baby with the bath water but we don’t add rotten soup to fresh soup, we need to get it right perhaps now is when… but we cant pretend we are running a good FA with all these things that are going on”.
-Myjoyonline