Published: July 3, 2024
Last updated: July 4, 2024
MONROVIA – The Supreme Court of Liberia will on Thursday, July 4, 2024, entertain arguments over the validity of President Joseph N. Boakai’s Executive Order No. 126, which established the asset recovery and property retrieval office.
By G. Bennie Johnson, Contributor
In what his administration termed as an effort to restore credibility, accountability, and transparency in the governance process, on March 6, 2024, President Joseph Nyuma Boakai issued Executive Order #126, establishing the office of asset recovery and property retrieval.
During the establishment of the Assets Recovery Task Force, an office under the Minister of State for Special Services, the President mandated the team to put into place the necessary legal framework for the recovery of assets wrongfully acquired by current and former government officials.
On Thursday, March 28, the court halted the Task Force from carrying out any further seizures until a pending conference on a Writ of Prohibition filed by the Management of Gracious Ride Incorporated was heard.
The company’s vehicles, predominantly taxis, were seized by the Assets Recovery Task Force on grounds that they were acquired through fraudulent means by a former top government official, specifically pointing fingers at former President George Weah’s Chief of Protocol, Madam Finda Bundoo.
Gracious Ride appealed to Justice in-Chamber Yusuf D. Kaba, questioning the validity of the presidentially-appointed committee tasked with tracking down illicit assets—a duty of the Liberia Anti-corruption Commission (LACC).
The LACC was re-established by an act of legislation with the mandate to investigate and prosecute crimes of corruption and educate the public about the negative consequences of corruption and the advantages of its eradication. Furthermore, the act grants the LACC direct prosecution authority to pursue cases involving allegations or individuals charged with corruption.
The assets recovery team was instructed to continue its operations after the institution’s request for a writ of prohibition to be issued by the high court chamber justice was denied.
Disappointed with Justice Kaba’s dismissal decision at the time, the car service “excepted” the decision and appealed to the Supreme Court’s entire bench. The business maintained that since the President did not have the authority to form an Asset Recovery Team, the group ought to disband.
In response to the petition before the full bench, the Ministry of Justice and LACC stated that the petitioner must mention the relevant legal sections verbatim under the fundamental legal concept.
Gracious Ride neglected to specify the precise sections of the LACC Act of 2022, section 22.2 of the New Executive Law, and the Anti-Money-Laundering and Counterfeiting Financing Act of 2021 that Executive Order No. 126 violates.
According to the government’s legal team, Gracious Ride management lacks the legal status and authority to bring such a petition before this Honorable Court.
They further argued that the issuance of an Executive Order is a quasi-legislative and judicial lawmaking authority and power granted to the President of Liberia by the 1986 Constitution, chapters 4 and 5, to eliminate the misuse of government resources and other corrupt practices.
The Asset Recovery team has been taken to court more than three times since President Boakai formed this institution.
Because they were unable to identify any constitutional clauses that would have made the President’s Executive Order No. 126, which established the Task Force, unlawful, the task force and the Ministry of Justice petitioned to have the Gracious Ride petition removed from the court docket.
Meanwhile, the high court will entertain legal arguments in the matter as both parties appear before the court on Thursday.
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