Tamale High Court Judge Justice Gyamfi Exposed

A probe report has exposed Justice Osei Kwame Gyamfi, a High Court judge in Tamale who overturned a ruling of another High Court.

The report was authored by Justice Doreen G. Boakye Agyei, indicated that Osei Kwame Gyamfi J. was not measured in delivery of his judgment and has to have more judicial restraint.

It will be recalled that a one man fact finding committee was set up by the Chief Justice, Justice Sophia Akuffo to look into the judgment.

In this direction, Justice Doreen G. Boakye Agyei has made these recommendations:

“It is my very humble recommendation that policy guidelines be given for the Tamale High Court Registry on whether judges at Commercial Court are to hear only commercial matters or can deal with other matters which falls within the ambit of the High Court.

“The petitioner, in my respectful view should be written to, to co-operate with Court of Appeal to prosecute the Appeal filed by the State to enable the matter to be concluded as early as possible.

“Justice Osei Kwame Gyamfi may be invited by the Honourable Chief Justice to meet with some of the Supreme Court justices to mentor him or be retrained by the JTI.

“What he did in effect was to arrogate to himself power of court higher than the High Court, to reverse the earlier decision of a High Court, which he had coordinated jurisdiction with.” 

The Chronicle also heard from credible sources that the Director of Public Complaints and Court Inspectorate Unit somewhere in February, this year, wrote to Justice Kwame Gyamfi Osei to respond to the petition.

The paper could, however, not tell the information provided by the learned judge before this report on him was written.

A Tamale based businessman, Abdulai Sirta had petitioned the Chief Justice, Justice Sophia Akuffo to investigate Justice Kwame Osei Gyamfi, a Tamale High Court judge, who he accused of giving a bizarre ruling in a case he brought against one, Patrick Ayaaba, the Assembly Member for the Teshei electoral area in the Bawku West District in the Upper East Region.

According to him, Justice Kwame Osei Gyamfi nullified an earlier judgement by another judge of the same High Court, Justice Daniel Kwaku Obeng, in a stealing case he brought against Patrick Ayaaba.

According to Abdulai Sirta, the petitioner, “there is something fundamentally wrong with the processes of the high courts, which must be cleared to engender public confidence in the justice delivery system in the Northern Region in particular and the nation as a whole”.

Abdulai Sirta noted in his  petition that on  December 11, 2015, he  reported the accused, Patrick Ayaaba, who was his employee to the police in Bole, for stealing his heap of sand, a by-product of gold mining called “over” worth GH¢400,000 at his mining site at Tinga.

According to him, the case  was sent to the Tamale Circuit Court, presided over by Justice William Appiah Twumasi, who after trial, sentenced the accused person to a fine of 300 penalty units (GH¢3,600), and in default, he would serve two years imprisonment. He was also to refund GH¢400,000 to the complainant in the case.

The accused, who was, however, not satisfied with the Circuit Court's judgement appealed against the sentence at the Commercial division of the Tamale High Court, presided over by Mr Justice Daniel Kwaku Obeng, who affirmed the earlier decision by the Tamale Circuit Court and increased the fine from 300 penalty units (GH¢3,600) to 5,000 penalty units, which is about GH¢60,000 or in default serve five years' imprisonment in hard labour.

Notwithstanding this ruling, Patrick Ayaaba, again sent the case to another judge at the same Tamale High Court against the Commercial Court's ruling, and in its ruling the High Court, presided over by Justice Kwame Osei Gyamfi, quashed the ruling by the Circuit Court at the time the Commercial Division of the High Court had upheld the ruling of the Circuit Court upon appeal.

According to him, the ruling by the High Court against the decision of its Commercial Division, which has the same jurisdiction, has raised questions about the justice delivery system in the Tamale Metropolis, and thus appealed to the Chief Justice to cause an investigation into the matter, to ensure that justice was duly served.

--Ghanaian Chronicle