{"id":105397,"date":"2025-12-04T14:48:38","date_gmt":"2025-12-04T14:48:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/?p=105397"},"modified":"2025-12-04T14:48:38","modified_gmt":"2025-12-04T14:48:38","slug":"osp-vs-kpebu-it-is-not-a-crime-to-make-an-allegation-against-a-public-officer-bentil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/?p=105397","title":{"rendered":"OSP vs Kpebu: It is not a crime to make an allegation against a public officer \u2013 Bentil"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n \t<\/i> Read Time:<\/span>1 Minute, 30 Second <\/div>\n\n <\/div>
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Senior Vice President of IMANI Africa, Kofi Bentil, has stressed that citizens cannot be criminally sanctioned for failing to prove allegations made against public office holders.<\/p>\n

Speaking in an interview on Joy FM\u2019s Midday News<\/strong> on Thursday, December 4, regarding the ongoing tensions between the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) and private legal practitioner Martin Kpebu, Mr Bentil stated that allegations against public officials must be handled through the appropriate channels, not through intimidation.<\/p>\n

\u201cSomebody has alleged a number of things against the OSP. Whoever has to hear those allegations must hear them and ask him to provide his proof.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt must be noted that when you make allegations against a public officer, it is not a crime. If you can\u2019t prove it, it simply means the person you made the allegations against will go free,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Mr. Bentil argued that if the Special Prosecutor Kissi Agyebeng believes they have been defamed, the proper course of action is to seek redress through civil litigation.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf they think they have been defamed, they can take you on. But it is not a crime to make an allegation, even a false one,\u201d he said. \u201cIt is just not good enough that people rise up and make allegations, but that still does not make it criminal.\u201d<\/p>\n

He criticised the OSP for what he described as an unnecessarily aggressive posture toward citizens who comment on or criticise the office. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe OSP should not take umbrage and run a citizen through all kinds of stresses simply because the person believes they have made allegations against them,\u201d he cautioned.<\/p>\n

He added, \u201cThere is a school of thought that believes the OSP itself should not be investigating these allegations against Mr. Agyebeng, but all that being said, let\u2019s see how this plays out.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\"OSPSenior Vice President of IMANI Africa, Kofi Bentil, has stressed that citizens cannot be criminally sanctioned for failing to prove allegations made against public office holders.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_2277560469115098_106292521332774":"","twitter_aToxNzczMzI3Njk4OTg4ODUxMjAxOw==_1773327698988851200":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1969,3866,113,1883,117,335,10,9,13370],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-105397","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hp-news-3","category-kofi-bentil","category-martin-kpebu","category-national","category-news","category-osp","category-politics","category-popular","category-public-officer"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105397","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=105397"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105397\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=105397"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=105397"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=105397"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}