In a unanimous ruling, the Supreme Court rejected a complaint brought by Ernest Thompson, a former director general of the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT).
His motion for the court to set aside two Special Audit Reports on the performance of an Operational Business Suite that SSNIT had bought was denied. Through the purchase and usage of the suite, Mr. Thompson is charged with costing the state $14.8 million.
The former SSNIT CEO testified before the Accra High Court that SSNIT had generated the two audit reports that included scathing and unfavourable conclusions against him without giving him a chance to comment.
He argued that this went against his right to a fair trial. Therefore, he asked the court to stop the Attorney General from presenting or making use of the aforementioned reports.
The Attorney-General won the case before the High Court. It was emphasised that the requirement for a fair hearing only applies in cases where the individual seeking to be heard is authorised to do so under the law.
The Court ruled that when such a right is absent, there cannot be a violation.
The Court recognised that Mr. Thompson was no longer an employee of SSNIT at the time the report was made, therefore SSNIT was unable to take any action against him. It said that the two documents were expert views that were not legally binding, not even on a judge in a criminal proceeding.
After that, Mr. Thompson went to the Court of Appeal to contest the High Court's ruling. He maintained that the Court ought to have prohibited the Attorney-General from utilising the findings after concluding that he had not received a fair hearing.
The High Court's ruling that SSNIT had not taken any action against Mr. Thompson based on the audit report was upheld by the Court of Appeal, nonetheless. When that failed, the former SSNIT Boss appealed the case to the Supreme Court. The audit report was not considered while making decisions, according to the Apex court.
It further said that Mr. Thompson was given the chance to reply to the audit findings via a letter from the Economic and Organized Crime Office that was sent to him. The Court observed that a document that was essentially an extract from the two disputed reports was attached to the EOCO letter.
As a result, the Court rejected Mr. Thompson's claim and assessed him 5,000 cedis in costs.