The Lawyer for illegal small-scale mining (galamsey) Chinese kingpin, Nkrabea Effah Dartey, has berated the state over its treatment of his client after it filed additional charges against Aisha Huang.
According to him, the additional charges were unnecessary because the crime, Aisha Huang, is being accused of is not that significant.
He lamented that the Attorney General himself went to court to discontinue the trial against his client in 2018 and has now turned back to file the same charges against her, onuaonline.com reports.
“I get a feeling that my client is being maltreated. Because as I have been saying, this is a small matter so why continue to harass this woman?” he questioned.
He added that “But the main point that I want to stress is that, I don’t see why the matter has been overhyped so much that the state has seemingly abandoned the circuit court trial and has revisited the case that was going on in 2018 and the state itself entered nolle prosiqui and today they have revisited it. I’m surprised,” he expressed.
Aisha Huang is now facing a total of six charges relating to illegal mining activities and other immigration offences.
Until yesterday, September 16, Aisha was facing two charges along with three other accomplices, in an Accra Circuit Court, after they were arrested earlier this month including mining without license and engaging in the sale and purchase of minerals.
The Attorney General and Minister of Justice, Godfred Yeboah Dame, had hinted following the re-arrest of Huang that he would reopen a case discontinued in 2018 against her.
The four new charges were filed at the Criminal Division of the Accra High Court on Friday, September 16, 2022. The virtual hearing took place in the court of Justice Lydia Marfo.
The charges are undertaking a mining operation without a licence, facilitating the participation of persons engaged in a mining operation, illegal employment of foreign nationals, and entering Ghana while prohibited from re-entry.
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Nkrabea Effah Dartey (left), Godfred Yeboah Dame (right)