POINT OF ORDER
By
KWAME GYASI
E-mail: makgyasi@ug.edu.gh
“! (2) This Constitution shall be the supreme law of Ghana and any other law found to be inconsistent with any provision of this Constitution shall, to the extent of the inconsistency, be void”.
—Chapter One of the Ghanaian Constitution
The illegal use of the frightening enormous powers of the President under the 1992 Republican Constitution while conniving and condoning with the Council of State as witnessed in the Montie 3 episode has cast into right perspective the wanton waste occasioned by the financial and economic implication of the 1992 Republican Constitution which must be addressed forthwith. To continue to spend an unspecified huge amount of state resources on a group of people who meet in a secretive conclave style setting with no accountability to the people supposedly offering advice to a president whose mind is already made up on important state matters is a height of immeasurable ridiculous tomfoolery which should no longer be countenanced. The Montie 3 were freed under a law which does not have existence or application under the Constitution. It is a typical situation which if sound judgment had not prevailed could have caused a constitutional crisis leading to the dismantling of our democratic dispensation all under the watchful and active participation of a Council of State. It should be necessary to subject the article which created the Council of State to scrutiny.
Article 91 of the Constitution which establishes the Council of State states as follows:
“(1) The Council of State shall consider and advise the President or any other authority in respect of any appointment which is required by this Constitution or any other law to be made in accordance with the advice of, or in consultation with the Council of State”.
“(2) The advice referred to in clause (1) of this article shall be given not later than thirty days after the receipt of the request from the president or other authority”.
“(3) The Council of State may, upon request or on its own initiative consider and make recommendations on any matter considered or dealt with by the President, a Minister of State, Parliament or other authority established by this Constitution except that the President, Minister of State, Parliament or other authority shall not be required to act in accordance with any recommendations made by the Council of State under this clause”.
“(4) The Council of State shall perform such other functions as may be assigned to it by this Constitution or any other law not inconsistent with this Constitution”
The composition of the Council of State makes interesting reading. The Council of State consists of 25 members, eleven of whom are appointed by the President. The President therefore has the opportunity to appoint eleven sound, sane, wise, healthy looking professionals and academicians of highest intellect and repute in various fields of human endavours to form part of the Council of State. But in reality what do we see. Many of the President’s nominees are disused extra time politicians who have antagonised their constituencies with vile language and obnoxious behaviours in the past. The general public knows where they are coming from and believes that they cannot offer any sane, independent, objective advice to a president who already acts quite clearly in politically partisan manner. Worse still, the President is not bound to act on the advice of the Council of State and this is ominous since all proceedings of the Council of State are considered secret. Thus, the public has no way of judging the competencies of the Council of State, the quality of advice it offers and the respect given to it by the President.
The superfluous nature of the Council of State becomes obvious when it is linked to the constitutional provision on the prerogative of the President to make appointments onto many state bodies and in particular the powers of the President to appoint ministers. One important area where the privilege to make appointments has always been grossly abused is that of the appointments of ministers and deputy ministers. Article 76, clause 1 states:
“There shall be a Cabinet which shall consist of the President, the Vice President and not less than ten and not more than nineteen Ministers of State”. Article 78 expects that majority of the Ministers of State shall be appointed from among members of Parliament. Clause 2 of the article also states: The President shall appoint such number of Ministers of State as may be necessary for the efficient running of the State”.
In our current dispensation what it means is that a person of dubious and idiotic credentials of a President with Parliament at his beckon can appoint 270 Ministers of State with 270 of them consisting of all the members of Parliament while designating 19 of them as Cabinet Ministers and with his Vice President designated as the 271st. Minister of State.
If the Constitution allows the President to appointment 19 cabinet ministers, an unspecified number of non-cabinet ministers, regional ministers for each region plus undefined number of deputy ministers, numerous district chief executives, should the President be allowed to spend state money to appoint additional citizens to advise him on any other issue, such non-binding advice, when such advice on any issue could be sought from any quarters by the President, even ex-gratis?
Should the Council of State be maintained at all, and if so, should it be in its present form or in a modified form? Should the mode of appointing the members be changed or maintained? If we are to maintain it, how do we shelter it from presidential abuse and ridicule and partisan politics and especially shield the members from performing executive functions on behalf of the President as happened under Jerry John Rawlings NDC administration era? If the Council of State is to maintain its dignity and independence, should the President have a hand in the appointment of its members? Is it not likely that by allowing the President a substantial leeway in the appointment of the members, the President will appoint people of like minds like him and therefore defeating the purpose of receiving sound, objective and independence advice? We must keep on making reference to our ability to minimize the operational cost of our democracy as the success of our democratic dispensation shall to a large extent depend upon our ability to institute cost cutting and cost saving measures.
In my humble view, the Council of State is one of the waste pipe institutions established by the 1992 Republican Constitution which acts a complete drain on the limited resources of the nation. It serves no democratic purpose and must be scrapped at the next available opportunity. The collective acts of omission and commission of the Council of State in the affairs of the Muntie 3 have consolidated its status as a complete waste pipe with no relevance to our democratic dispensation. It must be scrapped now!
This discussion cannot end without looking at the misuse of the President’s power to make appointments. While the President has the power to appoint persons onto other constitutional bodies like the National Security Council and the National Development Planning Commission (NDPC) among others, the number of persons and the mode of appointment must be reviewed. In the past such an important national institution like the NDPC, as an example, has been made the national Siberian territory for discarded politicians and technocrats who had lost favour with the establishment but yet needed to be fed, clothed and wheeled at the expense of the state. While an important constitutional body like the NDPC which should be the engine room of the nation’s planning culture and should be resourced and given all the necessary help it deserves, it is currently treated like a scarecrow while an impotent body like the Council of State is made to ride in full glory. A fool has said in his heart there is no God.