Judicial Corruption: Kwesi Pratt Questions Why Anas Edited Tape

Managing Editor of the Insight newspaper, Kwesi Pratt Jnr. has advised the media to be circumspect in their reportage concerning the judicial corruption expose` by Ace Investigative Journalist, Anas Aremyaw Anas.

He said it is disheartening to hear some media personnel make prejudicial statements about the much publicized Anas video.

“It is quiet frightening to hear some of our friends in the media making prejudicial statements about this case. They have already found the judges guilty before their trial. This couldn’t have happened in the 70’s and 80’s, many of them would have been in jailed for contempt...,” he lamented.

According to Pratt, the media can only wait patiently for the appropriate quarters to finish their investigations into the issue before they can have a fair and balanced account.

His comment comes after lawyers of the implicated judges had refuted the allegations that their clients took bribe in the Anas’ investigative piece.

About 34 High Court Judges and 100 more officials of the judiciary were caught on camera extorting bribes from litigants in a yet to be premiered report by Anas Aremyaw Anas and his Tiger Eye investigative team.

So far, a statement signed by the Judicial Secretary Alex B. Poku Agyemang indicates that the judicial council has suspended 22 of the said implicated judges whiles investigations continue.

Lawyer Charles Bentum representing 14 of the indicted judges noted that the video is a fabrication that is designed to get his clients unfairly tagged as corrupt.

The lawyer argues that, the video seems manipulated with several frames arranged in a way to portray some of the judges as taking money when they did no such thing.

However speaking on Adom FM Thursday, Mr. Pratt questioned why Anas didn’t send the full tape but an edited tape to the committee.

“The critical issue is whether the video has been edited or not and why it has to be edited” he stressed.

He further stated that “we know that Anas is working for mother Ghana but everybody is subject to scrutiny so let the committee finish their work”.

What he said he is so concerned about is that the truth stands in the judiciary system.

“If it’s true that there is such corruption in the judiciary, then we should collapse it and create a new one with integrity” he concluded.

Meanwhile some lawyers are seeking to place injunction on the September 22 premiering of the investigative piece titled “Ghana in the eyes of God - Epic of injustice.