The founder of the Diaspora Progressive Movement in the USA, Dr. Lawrence Appiah, has disclosed that Ghanaians are losing confidence and hope in the ability of the court to admiss justice in the country.
He accused the New Patriotic Party (NPP) government of appointing cronies to the judiciary.
In an interview with this portal, Dr. Lawrence claimed that President Nana Addo Dankwa has deliberately appointed judges who are in bed with him in order to skip accountability.
In a statement signed by Dr. Lawrence, he indicated that, in Ghana, the judiciary is gradually becoming a thin god, allowing them to pass some outrageous judgement.
He argued that some of the judgements passed by some notable courts in the country need much to be desired.
By citing worse instances, he said:
‘In Ghana today, the birth certificate is not a legal document to prove that someone is a Ghanaian. Meanwhile, the birth certificate is the base document used to prepare a Ghanaian passport, which is used to travel all over the world.”
He stressed that the judiciary is packed with NPP-inclined judges because this government has carried out a deliberate policy of putting their people on the bench to frustrate Ghanaians.
He further said that it will take a new leader like John Mahama in the next NDC administration to lead the process to repair what he described as the “badly dented image” of Ghana’s judiciary for people to win trust in the system.
In his opinion, the deteriorated image of the judiciary easily sparks laughter from the citizenry when one decides to go to the court for justice, adding that one of the scariest existential threats to any democracy is when citizens think their judiciary holds no value for them or no use to them, and this is the security threat that the National Security apparatus tried to draw the attention of the nation to recently but was poorly received by the president.
He added that such lawlessness in the country threatens the peace and stability of Ghana’s democracy and must be quickly corrected. If pragmatic measures are not taken, it will get to a stage where people will have no qualms about taking the law into their own hands because they do not have the confidence that they can get any justice in the system.
Read below his full statement:
Dr. Lawrence writes:
The dangers of our current judiciary
In Ghana, the judiciary is gradually becoming a thin god, allowing them to pass some outrageous judgments. Let’s look at some of the judgements by the udiciary:
In Ghana today, the birth certificate is not a legal document to prove that someone is a Ghanaian. Meanwhile, the birth certificate is the base document used to prepare a Ghanaian passport, which is used to travel all over the world.
The same Supreme Court ruled the member of Assin North, Hon. Gyakye Quayson, after he was elected by his constituents, that not only should he not be able to represent his constituents, they went further to order parliament to strike his name from parliament records as if he never entered parliament.
During the recently ended limited registration exercise by the Electoral Commission, the NDC and some civil society organisations filed a motion at the Supreme Court to stop the EC from conducting the exercise. The Chief Justice came and set a hearing date for October 17. Meanwhile, the whole limited registration exercise ended on October 2, 2023.
During the hearing of Hon. Gyakye Quayson’s case after the 2020 elections, the lower court ruled that he was not supposed to go to parliament while his case was ongoing. At the same time, another lower court hearing the case of the MP for Techiman South ruled that the people of Techiman South need a representative in parliament, so while the case was ongoing, the MP could still represent his people. The case is now stalled in that court.
This same outrageous court agreed with the Attorney General that, after Hon. Gyakye Quayson had been elected the second time to parliament, he was to appear in court every day for a hearing. The case became inactive when the minority in parliament resolved to join their colleague in court.
When the executive needs reform, the president is changed. When the legislature needed reform, the speaker was changed. When the judiciary needs reform, the chief justice needs to be changed. If Nana Addo could remove the Electoral Commissioner and the Auditor General, and it was good, should John Mahama be able to remove the Chief Justice? We need serious reforms in every institution, including the NPP. This is one of the reasons Ghanaians want him to be president again.
I heard, for talking too much, that the Paramount Chief of Dormaa Traditional Council and a High Court Judge, Osagyefo Agyeman Badu II, have been transferred from Greater Accra to the Volta Region. (Ghanaians are not angry enough.)
Mahama reba.
Dr. Lawrence is the founder of the Diaspora Progressive Movement in the USA.
By Lawrence Odoom