Supreme Court nominee wants Constitutional amendment

One of the President?s nominee to Ghana highest court, the Supreme Court, Justice Stephen Alan Brobbey has told the Parliamentary Appointments Committee that 10 years of the existence of the country?s Constitution is enough time to amend it to meet the current developmental needs of the country.

Justice Brobbey 59 who appeared before the Committee for vetting prior to their approval as Supreme Court Judges said, ?I agree that we have to take a critical look at the Constitution so that those portions which are not entrenched, and causing hardships should be cleared?.

Giving reasons for his position, Justice Brobbey explained that those who drafted the Constitution during the Consultative Assembly were institutional representations not quite fully a representative of the people as was Parliament, which was not conceptually, limited.

As such, he said, the framers of the document vehemently debated on certain provisions such as the dual citizenship issue, the vetting of judges and the politicization of local government and participation of chiefs in politics, and decided to leave them to the people?s representatives (Parliament) to decide on.

Justice Brobbey said the committee saw or realized the need not to entrench certain provisions in the Constitution as entrenched provisions like Section 11 and Article 19 (i) were causing a lot of problems now.

But the judge?s call for amendment is most likely to become the subject of intense political debate as some local journalists have already dismissed the suggestions saying the fact that the document is ten years old does not call for an amendment. However, if the judge wants specific portions to be amended, he should come clear and say so.

Asked what he thought about the public perception of the Supreme Court as partisan, he said the perception is not real and that the very nature of some of the cases tends to fan that perception.

To him, the greater majority of the cases handled by the Supreme Court had constitutional connections and if the government who is represented by the Attorney General won or lost, then people begin to read politics into the judgement. He added that the appointment of a judge to the Supreme Court should not be a criterion for people to determine where that judge would vote on issues.

When NDC?s Alhaji Mohammed Mumuni asked why he thinks the framers of the Constitution pegged the minimum number of judges that could be empanelled and left the maximum ceiling undetermined, Justice Brobbey said it was one of the thorny issues which they deliberately left out. ?If now there is the danger that the provision will be abused by anybody, it can be amended. We can easily get rid of it without going through a referendum?.