On 14th March, 2026, it had come to notice that Lawyers representing Ghana’s former finance minister – Ken-Ofori Atta had sought for their client permanent residency in the United States than to return to Ghana. Reports indicate that Ken-Ofori claims he would not receive a fair trial over the corruption-related cases filed against him; as such, he would prefer to permanently stay in USA.
Currently, Ofori-Atta is believed to have been held at a detention facility operated in Virginia by the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), after he was arrested by those officials in January for overstaying his visa.
The lawyer by name Enayat Qasimi informed Semafor.com (a US-based news website) that, his client – Ofori Atta has a pathway to residency in the United States and intends to pursue it. From this source, it indicates that, Ofori-Atta personally do not want to come back to Ghana and face trials concerning the charges leveled against him. Also, his lawyer raised some issues about Ghana’s Judicial Independence; where he mentioned that, the Judiciary in Ghana claimed or subjected Ofori-Atta to a “political witch hunt,” making his client believe that he may not receive a fair trial over the financial impropriety cases leveled against him particularly during his tenure in office from 2017 to 2024.
With this matter, Ghana’s office of the Attorney-General’s Department currently has also declined to comment, leaving the issue into the hands of the Office of Special Prosecutor (OSP) to handle. However, already in some months ago, Ghana submitted an extradition request to the USA seeking Ofori-Atta’s return, which the Semafor.com website also confirmed to the public that the request indeed was received, yet its accomplishment or implementation is what authorities in Ghana await for.
Again, it was said that Ofori-Atta’s visitor visa had expired in February and later revoked by the US authorities, where, court documents even indicated that he was earlier directed to leave the US country by 29th November, 2025, yet, he refused and had failed to do so, leaving him without lawful immigration status as witnessed, today.
Ofori-Atta is expected to reappear before the Annandale Immigration Court in Virginia on 27th April, 2025, after proceedings relating to his immigration status were adjourned.
At the moment, Ghana also awaits him and the five others to respond to the charges of more than 70 criminal cases linked to their several corruption investigations. These include; the contract award under the Strategic Mobilization Limited which caused a financial loss of more than GHS1.4billions to the state and many other criminal charges.
In view of this, Ghanaian nationals have termed the attitude of the former finance minister as disgraceful or humiliating. This is because, as to why he decided to leave his own country to seek permanent residence in another’s country; speak volumes of truth of the charges leveled against him and also questions his integrity, sincerity and transparency as a former leader to the state.