Justice Crabbe lauds Ghana’s judiciary

Justice Vincent Cyril Richard Arthur Charles Crabbe, a retired Supreme Court justice has expressed pride in Ghana’s judicial system emphasizing how good the institution is for democracy.

"I am proud of the judiciary, there may be bad nuts in there, but as an institution we have gotten a very good system and we must respect that system and allow it to work. Part of democracy is to have institutions which work. If we destroy the judiciary what can we have in its place?"

On Multitv’s current affairs program, PM Express Personality Friday, he called on Ghanaians not to accuse the judiciary as an institution when individuals working in it go wrong; adding that the judiciary cannot function appropriately if people constantly throw allegations at it.

Justice VCRAC Crabbe is the former director of the commonwealth secretariat scheme for legislative draftsmen for west, east, southern and central Africa including the Caribbean and is currently Ghana’s sole statute law revision commissioner and co- chair for the coalition for domestic and election observers, CODEO.

After establishing the electoral commission and being a sole commissioner, Justice Crabbe says he is glad that Ghana has kept the electoral commission as an institution and as democratic Paraphernalia.

"In every democratic system, there are elections but a successful election does not denote a successful democracy, it is just one part of it, democracy is bigger than elections. By election, we elect the people we think should govern us and it is good the electoral commission is working as an institution."

The retired Supreme Court Justice believes that challenging the results of the 2012 general elections in court is good for Ghana’s Democracy adding that its live telecast will ensure transparency and allow citizens to understand the process better.

Justice Vincent Cyril Richard Arthur Charles Crabbe, a name given to him by his father says his ambition for law begun to shape up from the lawyers in his family.

‘’My father was the chief registrar at the Supreme Court, my cousin read law at Oxford university and my elder brother also read law. My original intention was to read medicine and become a doctor because there were too many lawyers in my family but l ended up in law ’’.

Born in 1923, Justice Crabbe witnessed Ghana’s movement from the colonial system and believes it was good for Ghana to grow and do away with the enormous discrimination between Ghanaians and the whites.

‘’We saw the vast disparity between blacks and whites, they had a higher status than blacks, higher salaries etc.lt was Dr. Akwegyir who fought for blacks to have the same basic salary in those days.’’

Schooling in England for about 6 years, he says gave him the opportunity to know non-Ghanaians and understand their culture, but he returned to Ghana to serve his nation.

‘’I came back to Ghana and was made assistant crown council, l have been a public servant all my life and l enjoyed my public service. I have never been in the private service as a lawyer.’’

He said, after Ghana gained independence, the transition did not affect those working under the colonial government like it would have happened in recent times.

‘’There were no concerns or suspicions about the perception of being loyal to the colonial government as it is now. The only difference was that they were whites, but people were not sacked because it was thought that you were sympathetic to a particular party. It is so now because there are political parties. There was nothing like that then’’.

Justice Crabbe said the only time he had to leave office at the Supreme Court was when the Supreme Court was abolished during the 1972 coup.

‘’l had to go back as the high court judge then another constitution came, and l was one of the first justices to be appointed to the supreme court. I always say l has the distinction of being the only Ghanaian who has been appointed twice to the Supreme Court’’.

The retired Justice specialized in constitutional law and has been involved in the drafting of Ghana’s 1969 and 1979 constitutions as well as those of Kenya, Uganda and Zambia.

For him, constitutions by themselves do not make human beings good neither do they make politicians better. A constitution is good or poor depending on the people who operate it. He opined.

Justice Crabbe applauded the continuity in Ghana’s constitution but was worried decentralization in Ghana was not taking its smooth path resulting from too many centralized powers.

‘’Sometimes we must think of our own institutions and see how far we can develop our indigenous institutions and modernize them and let them work for us. We were not devoid of the sense of government before the white man came to this country,’’ he added.

He posited that our chieftaincy system was an epitome of governance with the institution of nifahene, benkumhene, krontihene etc.

‘’It is part of the systems of government we had, perhaps if we had developed them well enough we will not be facing some of the problems we are having now, but we are still learning,’’ he emphasized.