Akufo-Addo’s appointments improperly made – Anyenini

The appointments by President-elect Nana Akufo-Addo are unlawful, private legal practitioner Samson Lardy Anyenini has said.

Mr Anyenini argued that the president-elect may have breached portions of the Presidential Office Act, indicating that Mr Akufo-Addo had to make the appointments in consultation with the Council of State.

“If you designate someone as a National Security Coordinator, you ought to know very clearly that what the law provides is that you appoint that person with the advice of the National Security Council. You will also need additionally, to consult with the Public Services Commission.

The Public Services Commission ordinarily will take that person through an interview process and vet them. You don’t tell me that you put those people forward, announce them to the whole world, and then you go and seek consultation. That is not the proper way to go about it,” he said on Friday, January 6, 2017 on Joy FM.

But another private legal practitioner, Ace Anan Ankomah, has a different interpretation of the Presidential Office Act.

For him, the announcement by the president-elect was to inform the public about appointee-designates. Mr Ankomah, a member of pressure group Occupy Ghana, indicated that the procedure for making appointments official has not been exhausted, hence there cannot be said to have been any formal appointments yet.

Meanwhile, former Chief of Staff Nana Ato Dadzie has also argued that the president-elect has done no wrong.

“The announcement is only a preparatory announcement like a pre-incorporation contract where you announce how you want to do something before doing it.

Announcing the names before the consultation [with the Council of State] is only an indication. …There is really nothing wrong with it, but their appointments shall take effect from the date that they would have had the assent from the president after consultation with the Council of State,” the international transition consultant said.