Ghana’s Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) has launched steps to overturn a High Court ruling that stripped it of independent prosecutorial authority, as two divisions of the same court now stand in direct legal contradiction over one of the country’s most consequential anti-corruption cases.
Justice John Eugene Nyadu Nyante, sitting in the High Court’s General Jurisdiction division, ruled on Wednesday, April 15, that the OSP cannot prosecute criminal cases without prior authorisation from the Attorney General (AG), citing Article 88 of the 1992 Constitution. The court directed the AG’s office to assume control of all ongoing OSP prosecutions and awarded costs of GH¢15,000 against the anti-graft body.
The ruling emerged from an application by Peter Archibold Hyde, a customs officer charged in the so-called rice scandal case, Republic v. Issah Seidu and 3 Others, in which the accused are alleged to have used forged documents to unlawfully claim ten containers of imported rice at the Tema Port.
Two Courts, One Case, Opposing Answers
The legal situation has produced a rare conflict within the High Court itself. The Criminal Division, where the rice scandal trial is actively proceeding, earlier dismissed a similar application by the accused and chose instead to await a definitive ruling from the Supreme Court on the constitutional question. The General Jurisdiction division took a different course entirely, ruling directly on the OSP’s authority and ordering the handover to the AG.
Because both divisions operate with concurrent jurisdiction, neither is legally bound by the other’s decision. Ongoing criminal trials before the Criminal Division are therefore not automatically affected by the General Jurisdiction ruling and may continue while the apex court deliberates.
The position is more complex for the District and Circuit Courts, which are subordinate to the High Court and may, in principle, feel compelled to question OSP-led prosecutions until the matter is resolved at the Supreme Court level.
OSP Pushes Back
In a statement issued shortly after the ruling, the OSP rejected the decision as constitutionally defective, arguing that a court of coordinate jurisdiction has no authority to effectively invalidate provisions of an Act of Parliament. That power, the office insists, belongs exclusively to the Supreme Court.
The OSP maintained that its governing legislation, the Office of the Special Prosecutor Act, 2017 (Act 959), remains fully in force since the Supreme Court has not yet ruled on its constitutionality. All prosecutions it has commenced, it said, remain valid.
The constitutional challenge at the Supreme Court has been in motion since December 2025, when a private legal practitioner filed an action seeking a declaration that the OSP’s prosecutorial powers are unconstitutional. The AG’s own filings have largely supported that position, creating the unusual situation of the state appearing to argue against one of its own institutions.
The Supreme Court’s eventual ruling will determine whether the institutional independence Parliament built into the OSP at its founding in 2017 can survive within Ghana’s existing constitutional framework.
