(From left) Prof Stephen Kwaku Asare (Kwaku Azar) and Godfred Dame
Renowned US-based Ghanaian lawyer and scholar, Prof Stephen Kwaku Asare, has reacted to a claim by former Attorney General Godfred Dame that the Acting Chief Justice, Paul Baffoe-Bonnie, should not have been part of the Supreme Court panel that presided over the suit challenging the constitutionality of the suspension of Chief Justice, Gertrude Torkornoo, by President John Dramani Mahama.
In a post shared on Facebook on May 6, 2025, Prof Kwaku Asare, who is widely known as Kwaku Azar, without mentioning names, said that Dame’s assertion that Justice Baffoe-Bonnie was the only person in the world who stood to benefit from the suspension of Justice Torkornoo and should not have been part of the panel that heard the case, was far-fetched.
He explained that the accusation against the Acting Chief Justice has no legal backing because he is only in the role due to his position as the most senior Supreme Court judge, and that there is nothing which shows that he (Baffoe-Bonnie) will be made the substantive Chief Justice if Justice Torkornoo is eventually dismissed.
“The claim that the Acting Chief Justice has a personal interest in the outcome of the petitions seeking the removal of the Chief Justice is difficult to sustain — both legally and logically.
“The Acting Chief Justice assumes that role not by personal ambition or executive discretion, but by operation of constitutional command. Article 144(6) of the 1992 Constitution is unequivocal: ‘Where the office of Chief Justice is vacant or the Chief Justice is, for any reason, unable to perform the functions of his office, those functions shall be performed by the most senior of the Justices of the Supreme Court.’ The acting role is a function of seniority and circumstance—not personal choice,” Kwaku Azar wrote.
He added, “There is no assurance that the Acting Chief Justice will be appointed as the substantive Chief Justice if the petitions succeed. That appointment is the prerogative of the President, following the prescribed constitutional process. Conversely, the failure of the petitions does not diminish his standing as the most senior Justice of the Supreme Court. To suggest, therefore, that he has a personal stake in the outcome is to misapprehend both the mechanics of constitutional succession and the ethos of judicial service.”
A five-member panel of the apex court of the land, chaired by the Acting Chief Justice, Justice Baffoe-Bonnie, on May 6, 2025, dismissed the petition filed by the Member of Parliament for Old Tafo, Vincent Ekow Assafuah, for the reversal of the suspension of Chief Justice Gertrude Torkornoo by a 3:2 majority decision.
Before the judgment of the court on Tuesday, May 6, 2025, the decision to reconstitute the panel which presided over the case faced strong opposition from former Attorney General, Godfred Dame, who is also the legal representative for Vincent Ekow Assafuah.
Dame objected to the panel’s reconstitution, according to GhanaWeb’s legal affairs correspondent, George Ayisi, arguing that Acting Chief Justice Paul Baffoe-Bonnie, now presiding over the case, is directly affected by the outcome and, therefore, should not lead the proceedings.
His objection was unanimously overruled, but after the case, the former AG insisted that it was wrong for the Acting CJ to be on the panel that heard the case.
“I find it quite intriguing to start with that the Acting Chief Justice himself presided over the proceedings, and, as I said, I find it very incongruous because indeed, if at all, there is any beneficiary from all of this, it is the Acting Chief Justice. He is a direct beneficiary of all of these,” he told the media.
BAI/AE
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