According to government, its predecessors showed no urgency in settling those debts.
Therefore, the Atta Mills-led National Democratic Congress (NDC) government inherited judgement debts whose interests had reached “unimaginable” levels and, so, had no option than to pay those huge sums.
These were contained in the White Paper issued by government on Wednesday, November 18 on the report of the Judgement Debt Commission.
Delivering excerpts of the White Paper to journalists, the Attorney General and Minister of Justice, Marietta Brew Appiah-Oppong, said: “Majority of [the payments] were debts that have been outstanding for several years but which previous governments took no steps to resolve”.
“The said debts had therefore accumulated interests to unimaginable levels that any reasonable mind could comprehend”.
Notable among the judgement debts paid was the GHC51 million to businessman Alfred Agbesi Woyome which made headlines in the country.
It even led to a former Minister of Justice, Martin Amidu, heading to the Supreme Court to force government to retrieve the debt from Mr Woyome.
Source: 3news.com|Ghana