Attempts by the government to remove Gertrude Araba Esaaba Sackey Torkornoo, Chief Justice (CJ), from office have hit a snag, as legal action has been filed at the Supreme Court to halt the progress of the process.
Vincent Ekow Assafuah, Member of Parliament for Old Tafo, has issued a writ at the Supreme Court, praying the apex court to declare the consultation processes triggered by the President as Null and Void and of no effect.
The MP is seeking the court to make a declaration that the President is mandated to notify the Chief Justice about a petition for her removal and obtain her comments and responses to the content of such a petition before referring it to the Council of State or commencing the consultation process with the Council of State for the removal of the Chief Justice.
He is also seeking a declaration that failure by the President to notify the Chief Justice and obtain his or her comments and responses to a petition for her removal before triggering the consultation process with the Council of State constitutes a violation of the Constitution and the protection of the security of tenure of the Chief Justice, who is a Justice of the Superior Court of Judicature, as stipulated in Article 146(1) of the Constitution.
The Old Tafo MP is further praying the Supreme Court to declare the failure by the President to notify the Chief Justice and obtain her comments and responses to the petition beforehand amounts to an unjustified interference with the independence of the Judiciary, a violation of the fundamental right to a fair hearing, and renders the consultation process void and of no effect.
President John Mahama has initiated consultations with the Council of State following the submission of three petitions seeking the removal of Chief Justice Gertrude Sackey Torkornoo.
A statement issued by Felix Kwakye Ofosu, Minister for Government Communications, confirmed that the President had forwarded the petitions to the Council of State in line with Article 146 of the 1992 Constitution, which outlines the process for removing a Chief Justice.
As of the time of going public about the petition, the CJ had not even been given a copy of the petition or notice of same, suggesting an attempt by the government to bend the rules in seeking to remove the CJ at a cost for reasons other than the law.
The President has been hell-bent on removing the Chief Justice from office even before he became
President. In 2022, he launched a scathing attack on the judiciary and called for the removal of the CJ, claiming it would take a new Chief Justice to lead the process of repairing what he said was the “badly dented image” of Ghana’s judiciary for people to regain trust in the system.
