Justice Gertrude Torkornoo and President John Mahama
President John Dramani Mahama made history yesterday when he removed Justice Gertrude Torkornoo from office as the country’s Chief Justice.
This is the first time in Ghana’s 68-year independence history that a President has removed a sitting Chief Justice from office.
The President’s removal of Chief Justice Torkornoo follows the receipt of the report of a five-member committee that probed a petition filed against her by a man identified as Daniel Ofori, with two other petitions pending.
The Presidency yesterday morning, released a statement indicating that President Mahama had received a report on findings of the committee chaired by Justice Gabriel Pwamang, a Justice of the Supreme Court, one of the persons earmarked by some commentators for the position.
Just about three hours later, the big news dropped via a statement signed by the Minister for Government Communications and Spokesperson for the President, Felix Ofosu Kwakye, under the heading, “President Mahama Removes Chief Justice Gertrude Araba Esaaba Torkornoo From Office.”
The statement said, “After considering the petition and the evidence, the Committee found that the grounds of stated misbehaviour under Article 146(1) had been established and recommended her removal from office.”
It added that, “Under Article 146(9), the President is required to act in accordance with the committee’s recommendation.”
The historic decision which was preceded by another unprecedented one, the suspension of Justice Torkornoo prior to the committee’s work, has further fueled arguments about judicial independence and political interference in the work of the Judiciary.
This is particularly so when some members of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) are on record saying steps are under way to formulate a law that governs the removal of future Chief Justices.
Suspension
President John Mahama on April 22, 2025, suspended Chief Justice Gertrude Torkornoo following the setting up of a five-member committee to probe the three petitions calling for her removal.
The suspension followed the finding of prima facie by the Council of State following the forwarding of the three petitions by the President.
In the absence of Justice Torkornoo, Justice Paul Baffoe-Bonnie who is senior most judge at the Supreme Court, has been acting as Chief Justice in line with Article 144(6)(b) of the 1992 Constitution.
Committee
The committee was chaired by Justice Gabriel Scott Pwamang, a Justice of the Supreme Court and a former General Secretary of the People’s National Convention (PNC), who has been tipped by some as the next Chief Justice.
It also included Justice Samuel Kwame Adibu-Asiedu, a Justice of the Supreme Court who was one of the justices on the five-member panel hearing one of the suits and injunction applications against the removal of Justice Torkornoo.
It is recalled that Justice Asiedu was absent during one of the panel’s sitting due to what was described by the court as “unavoidable reasons.”
By the following week, he had been made a member of the committee that probed the petition and recommended her removal from office.
Other members of the committee included Daniel Yaw Domelevo, a former Auditor-General and a member of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) Operation Recover All Loot (ORAL) team; Major Flora Bazaanura Dalugo of the Ghana Armed Forces and Prof. James Sefah Dzisah, an Associate Professor at the University of Ghana.
‘Unlawful In-camera Probe’
Justice Torkornoo had always maintained her innocence and called for a public hearing after alleging that her rights were being violated by the committee during the in-camera hearing.
She also resisted suggestions that she should resign from the position since it had become obvious that she was going to be dismissed.
According to her, despite the draconian manner in which the Gabriel Pwamang Committee hearing the three petitions was conducting the enquiry, she was willing to marshal through and prove how frivolous the allegations against her were.
She also indicated that voluntarily resigning or retiring while the proceedings against her was still pending will amount to acceding to the allegations and emboldening the petitioners to say that the wild and unfounded allegations in the petitions were not defended because they were true or that she had no credible defence to them.
Legal Challenges
Justice Torkornoo also mounted a number of legal battles, challenging the processes leading to her suspension.
Chief among her complaints was that she was not even given a detailed explanation of the prima facie finding by the Council of State and therefore did not know which particular allegations succeeded at the consultation state.
The Supreme Court has dismissed three separate applications all asking it to reverse the decision of President Mahama to suspend Justice Torkornoo.
These were attached to various writs that challenged the processes leading to her suspension and the establishment of the committee to probe the petitions.
Justice Torkornoo also filed a case at the ECOWAS Community Court in Abuja, Nigeria, against Ghana.
The case marked a shift in the initial route taken by Justice Torkornoo and her legal team who had filed similar law suits at the Supreme Court and the High Court.
Again, she filed another case before the human rights division of the High Court in Accra. It was dismissed because the court said it did not have jurisdiction to hear a case that is already pending before the Supreme Court.
Support
Throughout her suspension, Justice Torkornoo enjoyed support from various professional bodies which called on the President to reconsider the decision to suspend her.
The Ghana Bar Association (GBA) at the close of its mid-year conference in April, 2025, resolved that the decision by the President to suspend the Chief Justice was unconstitutional as it did not follow the processes laid down by the 1992 Constitution, particularly Article 296.
It called on the President to revoke his decision while calling on him to make public the prima facie finding that led to her suspension.
The Bar Council of England and Wales (BCEW) and the Commonwealth Lawyers Association (CLA) also called for the immediate reversal and reinstatement of Justice Torkornoo as Chief Justice pending the final determination of the three petitions.
BY Gibril Abdul Razak