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Court chides AG over “act of vindictiveness” towards Exton Cubic



Accra High Court Judge today expressed his surprise at the failure of the Attorney General to hide its bias and vindictiveness towards local mining company Exton Cubic.

This is after he found that contents of one of the documents filed by the Attorney General were everything but helpful to the case he was supposed to determine.

Exton Cubic filed the certiorari application after the Minister for Lands and Natural Resources wrote a highly publicized letter on September 4, 2017 invoking three separate mining leases granted to the wholly Ghanaian owned company.

Exton Cubic in the application challenged the Lands Minister’s power to invalidate the licenses without first seeking the recommendation of the Minerals Commission and giving the lease holders a hearing.

Delivering a very eventful decision on the application today, the Presiding Judge Justice Ackaah-Boafo expressed his unhappiness with contents of a supplementary affidavit filed by the Attorney General.

Lawyers for Exton Cubic had first raised concerns about the said affidavit describing its contents as political and offensive.

They subsequently challenged the admissibility of the said document because it failed to raise any reasonable legal grounds.

Commenting on the issue the Justice Kweku Ackaah-Boafo said the document contained “emotive innuendos and not facts.”

He said the contents of the said supplementary affidavits exposed the government to suggestion that the cancellation of the leases was an act of vindictiveness.

The Judge also kicked against the AG’s suggestion that Exton Cubic should not have listed the Minister for Lands and Natural Resources as the Respondent in the matter.

The AG argued that she should have been named as Respondent but Justice Ackaah-Boafo said that would have been incongruent because the act being challenged was carried out by the Lands Minister and not the AG.

He described the AG’s suggestion as misconceived.

The High Court Judge also dismissed the claim that the Exton Cubic should have employed arbitration in resolving the disagreement with the State.

The AG argued that Section 27 of Act 703 mandated the mining company to first try to resolve the issue by employing Alternative Dispute Resolution.

Justice Ackaah Boafo however held that the AG’s position was flawed because she had already pleaded that Exton Cubic had no mineral right.

He said the provision in question only applied to a mineral right holder and that the AG cannot in breath claim the company had no right and in another breath ask the company to employ a procedure reserved for a right holder.

The Judge held that the right forum to hear the matter was the High Court.

Justice Ackaah Boafo ruled that the minister had no power to revoke the leases held by the company in such manner no matter what his intentions are.    

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