The AG signing the agreement whilst Georgetown officials look on
The Attorney General and Minister of Justice, Godfred Yeboah Dame, has brokered a historic deal to allow Ghanaian law graduates, lawyers and judges to embark on further studies in the prestigious Georgetown University Law Centre in the United State Capital of Washington DC.
The deal, an initiative of the Attorney General, is the culmination of months of intensive negotiations between the Office of the Attorney General and the Scholarships Secretariat on the one hand and the Georgetown University Law Centre on the other hand.
The agreement, seeks to implement a joint graduate scholarship programme over the next five years and results from an intention to strengthen the ties between Georgetown University and the legal fraternity in Ghana, enhance the linkages between the peoples of Ghana and the United States of America and improve cooperation between the two countries in the field of legal education.
Under the agreement, Georgetown Law Centre in collaboration with the Scholarships Secretariat, will offer scholarships to five (5) Ghanaians every year for five years, selected by a Selection Committee jointly set up between the two parties and chaired by a Ghanaian alumnus of Georgetown Law Centre, to pursue a Master of Laws (LLM) and Doctorate in Law (SJD).
The agreement commences immediately and will admit students into Georgetown Law from 2022.
Speaking at the signing ceremony in Washington DC with the Executive Vice President and Dean of the Georgetown University Law Centre, Professor William M. Treanor, Ghana’s Attorney General Mr. Dame, expressed his delight at the opportunities the programme offers.
“Georgetown has had a relatively long tradition of training lawyers, since 1870. The quality of the training imparted by Georgetown is reflected in the soundness of contribution of its alumni to the development of America and the world. It has produced alumni who have served and continue to serve in important offices of the Federal Government of the United States, the Judiciary, the Legislature, the business world and the academia,” he said.
“I have no doubt that the richness of its law faculty will positively impact on the number of Ghanaian lawyers and law graduates to profit from this agreement. The breadth of programmes the Georgetown Law Centre offers is the most diverse in the United States, as I have learnt. Courses like International Economic Law, Arbitration and Dispute Resolution, Securities and Financial Regulation and National Security Law will be of immense assistance in the shaping of the developmental agenda of Ghana,” Mr. Dame added.
He said “this agreement is in furtherance of my desire to ensure that Ghana has a functional and relevant legal system capable of meeting the challenges of an emerging economy, and that lawyers are equipped with the skills required in a modern economy. In this regard, back home, the Government has already taken significant steps with the massive increase in student admission to the Ghana Law School last year coupled with the ongoing construction of the Law Village Complex as well as the steady construction of a new twelve (12) storey building for the Office of Attorney General.”
For his part, Prof. Treanor lauded the personal leadership of the Attorney General in the development of the programme and the signing of the agreement.
He further expressed the hope that with the Attorney General’s leadership, further areas of cooperation with Georgetown University Law Centre, particularly in the training of judges, could be explored in the very near future.
Georgetown University, a private university in Washington DC, is the oldest Catholic and Jesuit higher education institution in the US, having been founded in 1789 by John Carroll, the US’ first bishop and archbishop, in the national capital of the United States of America.
Famous alumni include two former US presidents Bill Clinton and Lyndon Johnson; as well as several other Heads of State, including King Felipe VI of Spain and King Abdullah II of Jordan.
Former US Defence Secretaries, Robert Gates and Donald Rumsfeld; José Manuel Barroso, the former President of the European Commission are all alumni.