Adu-Boahene case: Court adjourns motion challenging prosecution’s account of evidence to Thursday

The High Court in Accra has adjourned to Thursday, October 29, a motion alleging that the prosecution in the Kwabena Adu-Boahene trial misrepresented witness testimony and documentary evidence in its written submissions. The application, filed on October 19, asks the court to strike out passages in the prosecution’s response to the accused persons’ submission of no case to answer, which they contend are unsupported by the trial record. At Monday’s hearing, October 26, the judge said the case docket was at his home and that he had only become aware of the motion that morning. The Attorney-General’s Office, which was reportedly served with the application on October 19, had not filed a formal response as of Monday’s hearing. Thursday’s proceedings will take place ahead of the court’s scheduled November 5 ruling on the substantive submission of no case to answer. Kwabena Adu-Boahene, Angela Adjei Boateng and Advantage Solutions Limited filed the motion through their lawyer, Samuel Atta Akyea. They also filed a separate reply to the prosecution’s opposition to their submission of no case to answer. The two filings serve different purposes. The reply challenges the prosecution’s legal arguments for requiring the accused persons to open their defence, while the motion seeks to have specific passages removed on the grounds that they allegedly misstate the evidence presented at trial. Six areas of disputed evidence In his supporting affidavit, Adu-Boahene identifies six categories of statements in the prosecution’s submissions that the applicants say contradict or are not supported by witness testimony and documentary evidence. One concerns the prosecution’s assertion that two witnesses testified that a purchase agreement and an invoice relating to a cyber-defence system were not genuine. The applicants argue that neither witness gave the testimony attributed to them concerning the purchase agreement, admitted as Exhibit X. They note that the second prosecution witness was discharged on April 27, 2026, while the agreement was admitted through the fourth witness on June 22. On the disputed invoices, the affidavit quotes the second witness as saying: “My Lord, it is likely one will be an error.” It also cites her subsequent explanation that she could not determine which invoice contained the error. The applicants contend that these answers do not support the prosecution’s characterisation of the documents as forged or fabricated. A second complaint concerns the prosecution’s assertion that the second witness testified that the National Signals Bureau had no contract with ISC Holdings Limited for a cyber-defence system. According to the affidavit, the witness gave no such evidence and instead acknowledged processing and paying an invoice covering delivery and acceptance milestones for the system. The motion also challenges the prosecution’s interpretation of the witness’s knowledge of an operations account. The applicants say she repeatedly explained that her security clearance did not permit her to know about certain national security accounts and activities. They argue that her testimony cannot support the broader assertion that the institution itself was unaware of the company or its account. Another disputed passage describes a March 2020 invoice as covering a one-time purchase. The affidavit cites testimony in which the witness acknowledged that the amount under discussion was not the full payment and that another invoice relating to the same acquisition had been processed. The application further challenges the prosecution’s assertion that the entire GH¢49.1 million was spent on the accused persons, their friends, associates and families, with none used for an official or approved purpose. The applicants say the third prosecution witness gave no such evidence. They point instead to testimony identifying ISC International Security Consultants Holdings Limited as the beneficiary of two exhibits, with remittance information referring to the procurement of a cyber-defence system. The sixth complaint concerns the prosecution’s reliance on Exhibit H to support an assertion that payments were made from Advantage Solutions Limited’s bank account to Adu-Boahene’s mother for a building project in Kumasi. Exhibit H, a copy of which is attached to the motion, is a photograph of a building. The applicants argue that it contains no banking or accounting information establishing the alleged payments. Their affidavit also cites the fourth prosecution witness as acknowledging that there were “no direct payments from accounts analysed towards Dorchester Heights”, the building identified as the Kumasi project. Applicants allege prosecution presented unsupported claims The applicants argue that introducing facts unsupported by evidence through written submissions amounts to giving evidence from the bar. They contend that the court should remove the disputed passages because they allegedly misrepresent the evidence on record. The prosecution’s October 9 submissions, signed by Deputy Attorney-General Dr Justice Srem-Sai, maintain that sufficient evidence has been presented to establish the essential elements of the offences. The prosecution argues that its case rests substantially on documentary evidence that was not undermined by the defence’s cross-examination and has asked the court to dismiss the submission of no case to answer. Those submissions predate the motion and do not directly address its specific allegations. The prosecution’s failure to file a formal response by Monday does not, in itself, establish the applicants’ claims. The court is expected to hear the application on Thursday, ahead of its November 5 ruling on whether the accused persons have a case to answer.