A Governance Expert, Professor Baffour Agyeman-Duah has said there is nothing wring with a President appointing his son or brother to serve in his government.
He intimated that in some advanced democracies including the United States of America (USA) whose practices are admired by many, the former President John Fitzgerald Kennedy appointed his brother to serve as the Attorney General.
In Ghana, he said, former President John Agyekum Kufuor also appointed his brother Kwame Addo-Kuffuor, who he described as very capable, to serve as Defence Minister.
Therefore there is nothing wrong with such appointments, the Chief Executive Officer of the John Agyekum Kufuor Foundation stressed.
Prof Agyemang-Duah was speaking on the Ghana Tonight show on TV3 Thursday August 26 on the topic ‘Conflict of Interest’.
He said “Even when appointments are made it is important to avoid a clear cases of conflict of interest. There is nothing wrong appointing your brother or your son. After all, in other jurisdictions even in the American democracy that we tend to admire, Kennedy appointed his own brother as Attorney General.
“I think when former President Kufuor appointed his his brother as Defence Minister there was was nothing wrong about that, a very capable person that he appointed. So those are really not the cortical issues.
“But where money or resources are involved, where there is a higher likelihood of somebody taking cover under the position and the connections available to him to kind of swindle the country, that is where I think my priority will be.
“When you are in the position to make big decisions or decisions that affect all of us, at the same time closely connected to some institutions through which these decisions perhaps may pass or the institution that may be used for the implementation, closely related to you, then there is likelihood that perhaps you made that decision knowing too well that certain benefits will accrue to that institution that you belong to.”
By Laud Nartey|3news.com|Ghana