KNUST inaugurates new Faculty of Law

Kumasi, March 4, GNA- Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, Asantehene, on Wednesday cut the tape to mark the official opening of a new Faculty of Law at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) in Kumasi.

The faculty, which is the second to be established after the one at the University of Ghana, Legon, set up some 46 years ago. It comes as a remarkable step to enhance legal education in Ghana since it would train more lawyers needed in the legal sector.

The new faculty will also address the increasing demand for the services of lawyers in the current constitutional regime, which embraces provisions of human rights.

In his inaugural address, Mr Justice George Kingsley Acquah, the Chief Justice, said the demand for more lawyers has not been matched by the requisite increases in human resource training and capacity building to meet the demand.

He said the new faculty of law is therefore an indispensable addition to the on-going efforts at expanding legal education in Ghana.

Mr Justice Acquah said the faculty of law at Legon and the Ghana School of Law have for nearly half a century seen the production of legal scholars whose intellectual competence has been acclaimed the world over, but noted that the size of these institutions coupled with their manpower and logistical strength have affected their ability to admit and train the number of lawyers the country needs.

He said the problem of inadequacy of manpower in the legal sector is due to the fact that the Attorney General's Department has for decades operated under capacity and also the fact that lay magistrates as a matter of necessity had to be used in the administration of justice.

The Chief Justice said the locations of the two faculties of law, one in the southern sector and now another in the northern sector, will address the imbalance by supplying the northern sector its fair share of lawyers.

He commended professor Kwesi Andam, Vice Chancellor of the KNUST whose vision and untiring efforts "birthed" the faculty and called for excellence in academic performance.

While paying glowing tributes to some of the legal stalwarts of the years gone by and named the faculty library after Sir Arko Korsah, who is remembered for being the first Ghanaian Chief Justice.

Paapa Owusu Ankoma, Attorney General and Minister of Justice, who chaired the function said the fact that lawyers are only trained for private practice is a misconception which needed to be changed. He said lawyers are needed not only in the legal sector but also in many sectors of the economy in this democratic dispensation. He therefore called on students and lecturers to strive hard for high academic performance that would produce scholars to rub shoulders with their counterparts elsewhere.

Paapa Owusu Ankoma was hopeful that with the support of the General Legal Council (GLC) and the university, the new faculty would be able to overcome initial challenges to emerge as one of the best law institutions.

Professor Andam, the Vice-Chancellor, said it was part of his vision to make the university which is essentially a technical one have balanced programmes in liberal arts to enrich scientists and technologists to make them relevant to society.

He said Mr Justice V.C.R.A.C. Crabbe, has been appointed to draw curricula and facilities needed for the take off of the faculty. He said the university is determined to set up teaching courts to train its students and appealed to the Chief Justice for permission to build an Appeal Court for the Ashanti region on the university campus and promised that the university in the event of that will provide accommodation for the sitting judges.

Later in an appeal for funds, Otumfuo Osei Tutu personally donated 100 million cedis.

Dignitaries who attended the function included High and Appeal Court Judges, members of the Bench and Bar, members of the General Legal Council and Deans of Universities in the country.