Meet Noah Adamtey. The lawyer who marched into the Supreme Court armed with an arsenal of constitutional reliefs, only to leave clutching one declaration that was never seriously in dispute. At the same time, the Office of the Special Prosecutor he sought to constitutionally restrain walked away with its investigative and prosecutorial powers almost entirely intact.
There is something uniquely entertaining about a litigant who arrives at court carrying eight reliefs, walks out with one, and then celebrates as though the Constitution itself has been rewritten in his honour. This case deserves to be taught in law schools under a new subject called Winning Without Winning.
The plaintiff asked the Supreme Court to dismantle the special prosecutor's prosecutorial architecture and wanted the court to declare that Parliament had overstepped its authority. He wanted Act 959 cut down to size. He wanted the OSP’s prosecutorial powers declared unconstitutional. He wanted attorney-general authorisation before every prosecution. He wanted the statutory independence of the OSP effectively neutered.
The Court answered with remarkable consistency. No. No. No. No. No. No. Then came the only relief that survived. The Attorney General remains the constitutional repositor of the state's prosecutorial authority under Article 88. Groundbreaking, except nobody genuinely disputed that proposition to begin with. Not Parliament. Not the OSP. Not even Act 959.
The real constitutional battle was never whether Article 88 exists. The battle was whether Parliament could lawfully confer prosecutorial powers on the OSP within that constitutional framework. On that question, the plaintiff suffered what can only be described as a constitutional demolition. The Court upheld Act 959.
The Court preserved the OSP’s prosecutorial powers. The Court confirmed that the OSP does not require a fresh fiat from every incoming Attorney General. The Court preserved every lawful investigation and prosecution that had already been undertaken by the Office. The Court even set aside the High Court decision that had thrown the institution into uncertainty.
That is quite an expensive journey merely to be reminded that Article 88 still says what Article 88 has always said. Perhaps the most ironic judgement. Not the judgment. It is the months that preceded it. This was the same gentleman who discovered a sudden affection for judgemental qualifications whenever ordinary citizens offered constitutional opinions. Apparently, one needed a practising certificate before being permitted to read the Constitution.
Those of us who argued that the attorney general's constitutional authority had never disappeared, while the OSP could simultaneously possess statutory prosecutorial powers, were treated as legal illiterates.
Today, the Supreme Court appears to have arrived at much the same destination. The Constitution remained intact. The OSP remained intact. The anti-corruption architecture remained intact. The plaintiff’s central project did not.
There is also a broader lesson here. Law is not won by the number of Latin phrases deployed in interviews or by reminding everyone who mentored you. Constitutional litigation is measured by outcomes, not pedigree. Courts pronounce on arguments, not family trees or chambers.
So yes, the plaintiff can rightly point to one declaration. He should frame it. Hang it proudly. Polish it every morning if he wishes. But perhaps he should hang it beside the seven reliefs that never made it home. Because when history records this case, it is unlikely to remember that Article 88 survived. Everyone already knew that.
It will remember something else entirely. That is an ambitious constitutional assault on the Office of the Special Prosecutor, ending by reaffirming the Attorney General’s existing constitutional role while leaving the OSP standing, prosecuting, investigating and very much alive.
The wise saying goes this way: sometimes, the loudest victory speech is delivered after the quietest defeat.
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