President Akufo-Addo has jumped to the defense of the Ghana Bar Association (GBA).
It follows recent claims by the Speaker of Parliament, Alban Bagbin to the effect that the GBA has become an elite organisation.
For the President, these claims are not only baseless but also unsubstantiated.
This was when the leadership of the Bar Association called on him at the Jubilee House Tuesday evening to thank him for honouring their invitation to attend the just ended Bar Conference.
The GBA, according to the President was rather an institution that has championed the course of good governance in Ghana since its establishment.
Apart from that, he said it was one of the non-governmental organisations that needed the support of all its members and the country as a whole to bloom i
He therefore expressed complete disagreement with those who want to brand the GBA as a highbrow organisation.
“I hear other people are talking about it [The Ghana Bar Association] being an elite organisation. I don’t know what they understand by elite.
I know that it is an organisation that is concerned about the welfare of the people, the quality of their governance, [an organisation] which has always been prepared and its leaders have been prepared to make the sacrifices that were necessary to make sure that we have a modern and respectable form of governance in our country, this cannot be an elite organisation”, was how he put it.
On the contrary, the President said the Ghana Bar Association is an organisation which speaks truth to power, one that concerns itself with the issues that affect the ordinary people of Ghana and that all attempts to paint her black must be resisted.
“It [The Ghana Bar Association] is an organisation that speaks to the interest of the people of Ghana for accountable governance and that is an organisation that deserves the support of all right thinking lawyers in the country” the President stated.
At a recent meeting with the leadership of the Law Society of Ghana (LSG), a new association of lawyers, formed essentially to rival the constitutionally recognised Ghana Bar Association (GBA), the Speaker of Parliament, Alban Bagbin is quoted to have said that the Ghana Bar Association has become an elite organisation and he would like to see a change, especially with respect to the views of the GBA on national and political issues.
In a statement later released by the Law Society of Ghana after its meeting with the Speaker, its acting President, Rockson-Nelson Dafeamekpor explained that nowhere in the Speaker of Parliament’s remarks during his engagement with the LSG, did he say he had resigned for the GBA.
“In his remarks, he expressed in strong words his revulsion about the state of the GBA and wishes to see a change for a better Bar Association committed to the aims, objectives, and ethics as captured and practiced globally,” the LSG’s acting President’s statement read.
By Charles Takyi-Boadu, Presidential Correspondent