The Majority and Minority members of Parliament have thrown their weight behind the need for Parliament to invite the Special Prosecutor, Kissi Agyebeng to brief the House on the circumstances under which he detained a private legal practitioner, Martin Kpebu, on Wednesday, December 3, 2025.
They described Kissi Agyebeng's decision to detain Mr Kpebu as an abuse of power, since Mr Kpebu willingly presented himself in response to an invitation from the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP).
In their view, the conduct of Mr Kpebu was a misdemeanor and the Special Prosecutor weaponised his powers, an act that the entire nation frowned on.
The Majority Chief Whip, Rockson-Nelson Dafeamekpor, and the Minority MP for Ofoase-Ayirebi, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, made the call on the floor of Parliament on Thursday [Dec 4].
Abuse of power
Raising concern about the action of the Special Prosecutor (SP) first, Mr Dafeamekpor said while legislators were on the floor trying to conclude business on Wednesday, news filtered through that “one of our seasoned lawyers” was invited by the SP.
He said Mr Kpebu presented himself willingly but he got detained by the Special Prosecutor.
He expressed deep concern at how, even after 10 p.m. Mr Kpebu remained in detention when he was supposed to have been granted bail.
Describing the bail terms granted him later as onerous, Mr Dafeamekpor said Mr Kpebu was asked to provide landed property in his own name, saying that “we cannot do this at this time”.
“Mr Speaker, these are serious matters, and we are saying that the Special Prosecutor has abused his powers in this matter.
“And I will not hesitate to say that we in this House created the Office of the Special Prosecutor, and if it continues to abuse its powers, then we may have to abrogate it,” he said.
The MP for South Dayi said: “This is because we cannot create such an office to handle important matters of concern for the state, and you will be detaining citizens that you have invited, and when they have submitted themselves, you detain them because of a certain supposed obstruction of an official public officer from performing a certain duty. That is the misdemeanor”.
He, therefore, insisted on the need for the House to invite the SP to come and brief the House on the circumstances under which he would detain a citizen under such “flimsy whimsical circumstances”.
Weaponising powers
Supporting the call for the SP to appear before the House, the Minority MP for Ofoase/Ayirebi, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, said he would have wished that the Business Committee had properly programmed the invitation of the Special Prosecutor “so that it would have been part of the earlier conversations”.
Describing the concerns of the Majority Chief Whip as an important matter, he said the matter was not entirely about the Office of the Special Prosecutor.
He said it was about a culture that had crept into the investigative and law enforcement bodies in the country.
“You appear before these bodies on your own volition to assist them in investigations, but they arrest and detain and put onerous bail conditions on you,” he said.
With the SP asking Mr Kpebu to bring landed property in his own name, Mr Nkrumah said the Minority was speaking against the onerous bail conditions that investigative bodies were beginning to “weaponise”.
“Unfortunately, Mr Speaker, when it happens to somebody, and he is complaining about it, you see absolutely nothing wrong with it, but when it happens to you, now you complain.
“So Mr Speaker, today he is complaining because it is his friend because in his view, the Special Prosecutor is weaponising his powers,” he said.
Non-partisan approach needed
He, however, urged the Majority Caucus to extend a similar invitation to all the other investigative bodies that people had raised complaints that they are beginning to weaponise the powers the state had given them.
“Today, because it has happened to them, they are complaining.
“If there is a practice that is untoward and it is being raised, let us look at it without partisan lenses, and if indeed they extend that invitation, I am not sure we on this side will object,” he said.
“We would not object to it but perhaps our advice would be that all the other investigative bodies that are being weaponized, which we have been complained about and which they turn a blind eye and a blind ear to, should be added so that we can do a non-partisan, diligent job in the interest of the public because precedents are being set which will not be good for our democracy,” he said.
