$6.3m at stake in delayed constitutional review process - Group

Ghana stands to lose a whopping $6.3 million dollars if the Akufo-Addo-led administration decides to forego the ongoing constitutional amendment process, which has for some years now been stalled.

Former President John Atta Mills of blessed memory in June 2010 inaugurated a Constitutional Review Commission which was tasked amongst other things, to aggregate the view of Ghanaians on the operation of the 1992 Fourth Republican Constitution with respect to its relevance in contemporary Ghana.

Subsequently, the commission submitted its report to the president in 2012 of which government indicated its acceptance of over 90 per cent of the recommendations in a White Paper. A constitutional amendment bill was prepared to that effect.

To the dismay of Ghanaians, the process has been stalled and its status unknown to stakeholders.

Some relevant stakeholders have blamed the lack of continuance to the change of government in 2017 and the death of the then president who inaugurated the commission in 2012.

But speaking at a press briefing in Accra, October 22, 2019, the Convener of the Election Community of Practice and Learning, Eyram Bashan has revealed that a huge amount of money was invested in the process at its inception, thus, halting or derailing the process by the ruling government will be another apparent waste of the taxpayers’ resources.

“…after the 2016 general elections and the subsequent change in government, nothing substantial has been heard or done to implement the recommendations from the constitution review exercise. There is no clear or detailed implementation action plan of which Ghanaians can hold government to account.”

She continued that, “We are extremely concerned that the US$6.3 million (GHC28.4million) spent on the exercise will be yet another waste of scarce resources if the process is not revived and sustained.”

The Constitution which has been flawed in some key areas (including concentrating too much power in the executive arm of government), has been operational since 1992.

The group had demanded amongst other things, a holistic and transparent process in the build-up ahead of the constitutional amendment.

This, however, is not the first time a group has requested of the status of the process. The rector of the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA), Professor Philip Ebow Bondzi-Simpson in January 2019 also described as unacceptable the Akufo-Addo government’s failure to complete the process.