How is it that a Petition Formally Submitted in December 2025 and Subsequently Forwarded to the Chief Justice has yet to Receive a Prima Facie Determination as of September 2026?

According to Section 15(3) of Act 959, the Chief Justice has 30 days to address such matters for prima facie determination. What has transpired in light of the considerable delay? Furthermore, there appears to be a notable inconsistency in the statutory provisions.

Private legal practitioner Martin Kpebu has stated that he submitted his petition to remove Special Prosecutor Kissi Agyebeng on December 11, 2025. In January, he clarified the legal process: the President has seven days to refer the petition, and the Chief Justice has thirty days to determine whether it presents a prima facie case. According to Kpebu's calculations, the petition should have reached the Chief Justice by December 17.

It is now September 2026, and the calendar has not malfunctioned. Section 15(3) of Act 959 says the President “shall within seven days” refer such a petition to the Chief Justice, who “shall, within thirty days” determine whether there is a prima facie case. That is not legislative poetry. Parliament put time limits in the law for a reason. Public power is not supposed to operate on indefinite convenience.

Mr Kpebu (esq.) now says his petition was indeed forwarded to the Chief Justice but has been “put on ice” because of what he calls a “political settlement.” His explanation is even more extraordinary: “People went to beg the president.” He has offered no public evidence establishing that allegation, and neither the Presidency nor the Chief Justice has publicly confirmed it.

But if Kpebu is telling the truth, Ghana has a much bigger problem than Kissi Agyebeng. Since when can begging suspend an Act of Parliament? Who begged whom? What was the settlement? Who authorised it? What provision of Act 959 permits a statutory removal process already before the Chief Justice to be politically refrigerated because unnamed people reportedly approached the President? And Kpebu himself cannot escape scrutiny.

A lawyer cannot spend months invoking the law, insist that his dossier is too strong to dismiss, then casually say he is “okay” with how the matter is being handled because he is “a practical person.” Practicality is not a substitute for legality.

The Presidency announced in February that three earlier petitions against Agyebeng had been rejected for failing to establish a prima facie case. Kpebu immediately maintained that his separate petition remained outstanding. The distinction therefore appears genuine.

So the question is no longer whether his petition exists. The question is what happened to the law after it arrived. If there was no political intervention, the Presidency and Judicial Service should say so. If there was, Ghana deserves names, dates, authority and explanation. Because a country governed by law cannot have statutory clocks that stop whenever somebody enters Jubilee House to beg.