The Attorney General's Office has identified about 30 cases under the Operation Recover All Loot (ORAL) initiative for prosecution, with between five and 10 already at advanced stages before the courts.

The Deputy Attorney General and Minister for Justice, Dr Justice Srem-Sai, said another batch of cases would be filed before the start of the new legal year in October.

Dr Srem-Sai said the cases were selected after investigators completed a review of ORAL dockets submitted to the Attorney General's Office.

"When we analysed the report, I think we had about 30 cases that we thought were prosecutable," he said.

He explained that some of the cases, between five and 10, had already been filed and were progressing through the courts.

Dr Srem-Sai said prosecutors would file another batch of ORAL cases during the legal vacation before the courts resume sittings for the new legal year.

"We have other dockets already. But we are going to start with them, either during the vacation, the legal vacation; we are going to start new cases," he said.

He said the Attorney General's Office would continue prosecuting ORAL-related cases where the available evidence met the legal threshold. "We will continue what we have done. We are going to continue prosecuting. As far as the ORAL is concerned, we are going to do it," he said.

Although he declined to disclose the identities of the next persons to be prosecuted, Dr Srem-Sai said more cases would soon be filed. "There will be some interesting cases coming soon," he said.

He said decisions on which cases to prosecute were based solely on the available evidence and not on the profile of suspects or the level of public interest.

"When we work, we don't actually focus on which one is big or which one is that. We focus on which one is prosecutable," he said.

On the SkyTrain case, Dr Srem-Sai said the prosecution had closed its case and was awaiting the next stage of the trial after the accused persons failed to file their witness statements within the period set by the court.

"SkyTrain, we have closed our case. The two accused persons were supposed to file their witness statements... As of this morning, they have not filed anything... We are going back to court tomorrow," he said.

Touching on the case involving the former Director-General of the National Signals Bureau, Kwabena Adu-Boahene, Dr Srem-Sai said the prosecution was close to ending its case.

He said the prosecution's fourth witness was still giving evidence and was expected to complete testimony within the week or the following week.

"Our fourth witness is in the box and we hope that by this week or next week he will have been discharged. When that happens... we have closed our case," he said.

On the report submitted by the former Minister of Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation, Professor Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng, on illegal mining, Dr Srem-Sai said investigators had submitted reports to the Attorney General's Office, but further investigations had been ordered before any decision on prosecution would be taken.

"We have received investigative reports. We have made further directions to investigate this with other evidence for us to form an opinion on it," he said.

He explained that where gaps were identified in the evidence, investigators were directed to carry out further work before the Attorney General's Office determined whether to proceed with prosecution.

"The investigators bring the first report. We look at it, we find gaps. We ask them to fill the gaps and then bring them back until we are certain that we have filled all the gaps. Then we take the step to go and prosecute," he said.

In February this year, the Attorney General and Minister for Justice, Dr Dominic Ayine, said his office was reviewing 16 ORAL dockets.

He said investigators would be directed to obtain additional evidence where necessary before any decision to prosecute was taken.

Dr Ayine also stated that no plea bargain or negotiations had been entered into with persons implicated in the ORAL investigations.