EOCO Can’t Regulate Lawyers’ Fees  – Manhyia South MP Fires Back

Manhyia South MP Nana Agyei Baffour Awuah has hit back at allegations that his law firm received GHC2.2 million in legal fees, questioning whether the Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO) has any business regulating what lawyers charge for their work.

In a Facebook post on Saturday, 26 September, the lawmaker said the allegations against him keep shifting and he suggested this is a sign that the claims are more about propaganda than facts.

“First, they said I refused to honour their invitation. When that propaganda failed, they now claim that I charged unapproved professional fees,” Baffour Awuah wrote.

The MP then turned the question back on EOCO: since when did the state agency become the body that determines or approves lawyers’ fees?

At the centre of the dispute is a claim that GHC2.2 million out of a GHC5 million sum was paid to Baffour Awuah or his law firm, SBA and Partners, as legal fees.

The MP flatly denied it. Neither he nor his firm, Baffour Awuah said, received any such payment.

He also rejected allegations that he or his firm transferred money to the then Managing Director of SIC Life Savings and Loans.

Baffour Awuah further dismissed claims tied to an alleged judicial sale of a property for GHC24 million. According to him, no such sale ever took place therefore the claim that GHC6 million from a supposed buyer was paid to him or his firm simply doesn’t hold.

Background to the row

The allegations are the latest twist in an ongoing standoff between the MP and EOCO. It follows an earlier incident in which suspected security operatives tried without success to arrest him at the Accra High Court.

EOCO has claimed that some individuals helped the MP evade its officers. Baffour Awuah, for his part, has disputed the circumstances surrounding that supposed attempted arrest.