Appeal Court Clears Former MASLOC Chief, Reversing 10-Year Jail Sentence

Ghana’s Court of Appeal has overturned the conviction of former Microfinance and Small Loans Centre (MASLOC) Chief Executive Sedina Tamakloe-Attionu, acquitting and discharging her after concluding that prosecutors failed to prove their case beyond reasonable doubt.

The decision reverses a 2024 High Court judgment that had sentenced Tamakloe-Attionu to 10 years’ imprisonment on charges including causing financial loss to the state and stealing over the alleged diversion of public resources during her tenure at the state-backed lending institution.

In a significant setback for the prosecution, the appellate court held that the evidence presented fell short of the criminal standard required for conviction, effectively nullifying both the guilty verdict and the sentence imposed by the lower court.

The appeal also challenged the legality of her conviction and sentencing in absentia after she travelled to the United States in 2021 for medical treatment with the High Court’s permission but failed to return while proceedings continued. Following her extradition to Ghana in June 2026, she began serving her sentence at the Nsawam Medium Security Female Prison before the Court of Appeal’s ruling brought the case to a dramatic conclusion.

The judgment marks one of the most consequential reversals in Ghana’s recent anti-corruption prosecutions and is likely to renew debate over prosecutorial standards, trial procedures conducted in absentia and the evidentiary threshold required in complex public-sector corruption cases.

For the state, the ruling represents a judicial reminder that criminal convictions—particularly in high-profile corruption cases—must rest on evidence capable of satisfying the stringent “beyond reasonable doubt” standard, regardless of public interest or political significance.