Judiciary Balancing Out Sputum (1)
The history of the judiciary in Ghana has not been good news but a kind of topsy-turvy.
The fact that the judiciary is the bastion of the rule of law, democracy and good governance is not lost on students of law, politicians and even ordinary citizens. From independence and in the First Republic, judges were dismissed, while in the Second Republic, the government ignored a court order on the reinstatement of civil servants and other actions until the advent of the Fourth Republic in January 1993.
Even under this dispensation, we have not been very comfortable with the outburst of the late Dr. Kwabena Adjei in 2010 at a media engagement at the Castle that there are several ways of killing a cat, in an apparent reference to the continued stay in office of the then Chief Justice Georgina Woode.
It has been said time and again that the “wheels of justice turn slowly, but grind exceeding fine,” a metaphor attributed to some philosophers but many lack patience for the law. The moment cases don’t go in their favour, judges must be tagged in negative terms.
Our worry has been that sometimes lawyers who must know better engage in this tragic posturing although they are fully aware that cases are either won or lost at the court.
Our judges are human and subject to all human frailties, but majority of them know the heavy burden society has imposed on them to uphold the rule of law and to “do right to all manner of people according to law, without fear or favour, affection or ill-will.” That being the case, all Ghanaians including former President John Mahama must be insisting on the rule of law at the Bench instead of proposing a very dangerous formula of “balancing out” the numbers on the Bench.
Mr. Mahama knows that the rule of NDC lawyers he is encouraging to go to Bench in case he assumes power will not promote the universally acknowledged rule of law but rule by men. The former President knows that there have been occasions when judges appointed by a particular government had ruled against the regime based on his or her interpretation of the law.
Mr. Mahama must be told that in case he becomes president again, the Constitution enjoins him to make appointments to the Bench but not based on his dangerous and ridiculous “balancing out” formula but on merit.
Any qualified Ghanaian who qualifies for a position in the country must be given equal opportunity to have a shot at it, but not for the mere reason of his affiliation to a political party.
Mr. Mahama has the tendency to deepen political polarisation in the country. We urge Ghanaians not to fall for the former President’s claim that Ghanaians suffer from forgetfulness by recalling his assurance to NDC members that he will recruit their children into the security services in the event that he is given the mandate to rule.
The present posturing of former President Mahama portend deep division in the country as the NDC platform leading to the 2024 elections is just the interest of his party people. His claim to be on a rescue mission is just a claim to personal glory and claim perhaps what he left at the Jubilee House on January 7, 2017.
Ghanaians are urged to open their eyes and ears to scrutinise the messages of Mr. Mahama, the NDC and its leaders and people like Mr. Martin Kpebu, who no longer hides his personal hatred for Nana Akufo-Addo and Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia by calling on them to call early elections to avoid a coup d’etat. There are others in academia, civil society and media who claim to be neutral but working for Mahama’s so-called rescue mission.