The Court of Appeal has acquitted and discharged the former chief executive officer of the Microfinance and Small Loans Centre (MASLOC) Sedina Tamakloe-Attionu, overturning her conviction and ten-year prison sentence imposed by the high court.

In a judgment delivered on Thursday (30 July 2026), the Appeal Court held that the prosecution failed to prove its case against the former MASLOC boss beyond reasonable doubt, the required standard in criminal trials.

The decision in effect sets aside the convictions entered against her by the Accra High Court in 2024 on charges of causing financial loss to the state, stealing and other offences relating to the alleged misappropriation and diversion of public funds during her tenure at MASLOC from 2013 to 2016, under the first Mahama administration.

The case against Tamakloe-Attionu commenced in January 2019 and she was convicted on 72 counts in April 2024. She filed an appeal challenging both the substance of the conviction and the process through which she was tried and sentenced in absentia.

Her legal team argued that the charges against her were fundamentally defective and that the prosecution failed to establish the alleged offences to the criminal standard of proof.

Tamakloe-Attionu was extradited from the United States and returned to Ghana on 9 June 2026. She began serving her ten-year sentence at the Nsawam Medium-Security Female Prison on 24 June.

She had travelled to the United States in 2021 with permission from the high court to seek medical treatment while her trial was ongoing, but failed to return to Ghana to continue the proceedings.

Following her return, she was taken into custody to begin serving the sentence while the Court of Appeal determined her challenge.

The appellate court’s decision now clears the former MASLOC chief executive on all counts and brings to an end the prison term imposed by the high court.

The case has attracted significant public attention because of legal questions surrounding trials conducted in absentia, extradition and the prosecution of alleged financial crimes involving public officials.