Ghana’s Foreign Affairs Minister, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, has disclosed that the United States government has given its word to Ghana that it will not impede the extradition of former Finance Minister Ken Ofori‑Atta and former MASLOC boss Sedina Tamakloe Attionu.

Mr Ablakwa disclosed after a bilateral meeting held yesterday in Accra with the acting USA Ambassador to Ghana, Rolf Olson and his entourage.

“The United States Government has assured that, without prejudice to judicial processes, it will not stand in the way of Ghana as regards the removal of Ken Ofori‑Atta and Sedina Tamakloe Attionu,” he said.

About Ken's arrest

On January 7, Ken Ofori-Atta’s lawyers, Menka-Premo, Osei-Bonsu, Bruce-Cathline and Partners issued a statement confirming their client's arrest by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) over his immigration status.

It explained that, “The United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), as of yesterday, detained the former Minister for Finance, Mr Ken Ofori-Atta, regarding the status of his current stay in the United States. His US legal team is in contact with ICE and expects the matter to be resolved expeditiously.”

Ken Ofori-Atta left Ghana for the United States on January 4, 2025, according to investigative reporting detailing his departure timeline and visa use. As of today, January 8, 2026, that places his time in the U.S. at approximately 1 year and 4 days, following which he has been detained.

While his lawyers didn’t explicitly state whether he had overstayed his visa time, they noted that “Mr Ofori-Atta has a pending petition for adjustment of status, which authorises a person to stay in the US legally past the period of validity of their visa. Under US law, a change of status by this method is common.”

This comes amid a legal tussle involving Ofori-Atta. The Special Prosecutor, for about eight months, has been making efforts to bring him to Ghana to face the law over some corruption-related issues.

Ofori-Atta, who served as Ghana’s Finance Minister from 2017 to 2023, steered fiscal policy during the COVID-19 pandemic, debt restructuring efforts and IMF negotiations.

His extended stay in the U.S. has coincided with ongoing legal proceedings in Ghana, including corruption-related charges filed by the Office of the Special Prosecutor in November 2025, currently at the case-management stage.

Meanwhile, a request for Ken Ofori-Atta and an alleged accomplice, Ernest Darko Kore, from the United States has formally been submitted by the Attorney General (A-G), Dr Dominic Ayine.

Speaking at the government’s Accountability Series held on Thursday, December 18, Minister for Justice and Attorney General, Dr. Dominic Ayine, said the duo’s extradition processes were initiated by the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) on November 19.

He added that the Attorney General’s Department initially examined the documents related to the case; however, the International Cooperation Unit found that some parts of the paperwork were incomplete.

Dr. Ayine added, “As a result, we communicated our observations to the Office of the Special Prosecutor in a letter dated November 25 and requested additional documentation to ensure completeness.”

He noted that, in response, the OSP finalized the extradition request package on December 9 by providing supplementary documents and addressing the issues raised by the International Cooperation Unit.

The Attorney-General (A-G), Dr Dominic Ayine, would have a difficult time in getting former Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta back in Ghana to face corruption charges, private legal practitioner Austin Brako-Powers has noted.

Sedinam case, her prosecution and extradition

Ex-MASLOC CEO Sedinam Tamakloe-Attionu, who was convicted of causing financial loss to the state and sentenced in Ghana in April 2024, has also been a subject of ongoing extradition efforts. She was tried in absentia and has since then been in the USA for nearly two years since her sentence.

The Attorney General said the formal request sent to the US Department of Justice in mid‑2024 remains under review, with authorities awaiting procedural completion.

US Ambassador's earlier comments on his country's extradition process

Chargé d'Affaires at the U.S. Embassy in Accra, Rolf Olson, during a media roundtable conversation with visiting Deputy Assistant Secretary for West Africa in the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of African Affairs, William B. Stevens, on Friday, December 12, 2025, at the U.S. Embassy in Accra, emphasised that, the US government is always open to extradition requests from Ghana however, because the process is structured, and judicially driven, it usually takes time to complete.

“We are always open to receiving extradition requests. That is an important part of any good bilateral relationship, and certainly of ours. The process of evaluating an extradition request on the American side is very well established, but it is not generally very quick. Once we receive a request, it goes through the various mechanisms we have in place,” he said.

As of Monday, December 8, 2025, more than 3,100 people had signed a public petition addressed to the US Embassy in Accra demanding the extradition of former Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta.

US-based Ghanaian Professor Stephen Kwaku Asare, also known as Kwaku Azar, started a petition on December 2, asking American authorities to work with the Ghanaian government to help extradite Mr Ofori-Atta, who has been officially charged with economic crimes and corruption-related offences.

However, commenting on whether or not the American government was willing to cooperate with local authorities to trigger any process in the US, Rolf Olson explained that processes for evaluating an extradition request on the American side are “very well-established and it is generally not very quick.”

He added that if the US receives a request, it goes through the various mechanisms. “But the door is always open to requests. There is no individual case that can be prejudged because US judges make the decisions, so they can approve or disapprove a request."

Mr Rolf Olson revealed that, since President Mahama took office this year, the US government has extradited nine Ghanaians, with the majority of the cases linked to romance scams or what is recently described as “elder crime”.“Since President Mahama took office at the beginning of the year, Ghana has extradited nine individuals to the United States. Most of them have been involved in cybercrime, or what is commonly referred to as elder crime. These individuals can victimise anyone, and perhaps they already have, though that remains to be established. If proven in court, they are the kind of people who should be in prison, not free to take advantage of others, particularly older persons.

Although anyone could fall victim to such crimes, the idea of being targeted in this way is understandably horrifying,” he stressed.