Private legal practitioner, Martin Kpebu is raising concerns regarding threats by businessman Alfred Agbesi Woyome to sue the General Legal Council (GLC) over legal practitioner, Samuel Nerquaye-Tetteh’s disbarment from the bar.
Mr. Woyome threatened to sue the GLC for taking such an action against former Chief State Prosecutor, Samuel Nerquaye-Tetteh for professional misconduct.
Kpebu asserts that Woyome’s willingness to invest in this legal action highlights his substantial resources, suggesting that the government should reciprocate by pursuing the payment of outstanding debts owed to the state.
Martin Kpebu emphasized the need for the Attorney General to initiate efforts to compel Woyome to settle the monies owed the state.
“Once you find Woyome willing to extend resources to Nerquaye-Tetteh, the immediate point that jumps at me is that, where is the balance of the money that Woyome owes to the state? It is our money—money that we badly need to eliminate the myriad of social problems—that we have to demand that Woyome return every Cedi. Now that Woyome has money to pay lawyers to court to support Nerquaye-Tetteh, this should be the time that the Attorney General should also go after him to return the monies, and since he has money with him, he should be willing to pay.”
Background
Samuel Nerquaye-Tetteh, was disbarred as a lawyer by the General Legal Council for collecting GH¢400,000 from businessman Alfred Agbesi Woyome in 2011.
The means he can never practice as a lawyer again in Ghana after the Disciplinary Committee of the GLC, the regulatory body of the legal profession, found him guilty of professional misconduct under Rule 2(2) of the Legal Profession (Professional Conduct and Etiquette) Rules, 1969 (L.I. 613).
In a notice dated January 31, 2024, the GLC said while defending the state against a suit by Woyome in 2011, Mr Nerquaye-Tetteh personally caused the direct transfer of an amount of GH¢400,000 from Mr Woyome to the bank account of his wife.
Mr Nerquaye-Tetteh, the GLC said, could not offer any reasonable explanation for the said transfer of the GH¢400,000 into his wife’s bank account from Mr Woyome.
