Accra, Ghana: Ghana’s judicial council says it has suspended 22 judges and magistrates implicated in alleged corrupt practices.

The statement on Wednesday says that the council has also started the process to investigate the allegations and other court officials who may have collaborated.

The state-owned Daily Graphic says a local investigative journalist caught 180 officials on camera taking bribes and extorting money from litigants.

A judicial official said one of the judges involved in the allegations had turned in his resignation on Tuesday. The official was not permitted to speak to the media.

An anticorruption group, the Ghana Integrity Initiative, and a local policy think tank, Institute of Economic Affairs, have for years cited the judiciary as one of the most corrupt institutions in Ghana.

The judicial council is to start an inquiry following the sackings, initiated by a two-year investigation by a top journalist, BBC reported.

Anas Aremeyaw Anas’s says he has nearly 500 hours of video evidence on tape, which have been handed over to the chief justice.

The attorney-general has granted the journalist immunity under the whistle-blower act to pursue the story.

Those implicated in the investigation have been asked to appear before the judicial council on Thursday.

None of the judges implicated have so far commented on the allegations.

The BBC reported that during his investigation Anas, who is also a lawyer, approached the judges offering bribes if they agreed to set his purported clients free.

In some instances, he pretended to be a litigant and offered bribes.

Deputy Attorney-General Dominic Ayine confirmed to the BBC that Anas was granted immunity two weeks ago.

The journalist then followed a constitutional process to ensure that all the judges he named would be officially investigated by petitioning both the president and chief justice.

Allegations of corruption in the judiciary are not new in Ghana — but it has been difficult to provide hard evidence to the judicial council.

Ace Ankomah, from one of Ghana’s biggest law firms Bentsi-Enchill, Letsa and Ankomah, told the BBC the investigation was a good opportunity to root out corruption.

“Corruption is like a cancer. You treat a cancer with chemotherapy. Tomorrow the judges are being called to face disciplinary committees. That is what gives me confidence, that things can be fixed.”