God willing, the next Attorney-General and Minister for Justice is a young man with an exemplary record in legal profession and a huge inspiration to many.
Born on 5th June, 1979, Godfred Yeboah Dame obtained his GCE Ordinary Level and Advanced Level Certificates from Adisadel College between 1989 and 1996. He graduated with a Bachelor of Laws degree (LLB) in 2001. He proceeded to the Ghana School of Law from where he obtained his professional law qualification in 2003.
On being called to the Bar in October, 2003, Godfred Yeboah Dame commenced his professional law practice with the firm of Messrs. Akufo-Addo, Prempeh & Co., an elite law firm in Ghana, specializing in various aspects of civil litigation.
Godfred Yeboah Dame rapidly and firmly established himself as one of Ghana’s leading advocates, conducting with a remarkable degree of success many of the politically important trials and constitutional cases in the Superior Courts of Ghana.
In 2006, in recognition of his contribution towards the defence of media and human rights, rule of law and civil liberties generally in Ghana, Mr. Dame was one of a few lawyers from across Africa and the rest of the world awarded the Open Society Initiative Fellowship, and selected to pursue the Programme in Comparative Media Law and Policy (PCMLP) at the University of Oxford’s Centre for Socio-Legal Studies.
Mr Dame’s active law practice saw him take charge of a significant number of high profile and landmark cases in the Supreme Court of Ghana which contributed to the advancement of constitutional law, human rights, criminal law and good governance in the country, including serving as counsel for the New Patriotic Party (NPP) in many cases of moment for the party between 2012 and 2016.
In 2016, he was a member of the NPP Manifesto Committee on Governance which drafted the Party’s proposed policies for the Legal and Governance Sector. In 2013, together with three of the Party’s former Attorneys-General, Hon. Papa Owusu-Ankomah, Hon. Ayikoi Otoo and Hon. Joe Ghartey, he was appointed to review the 2013 Election Petition Verdict and come up with proposals to avoid a defeat of the Party in the 2016 elections which would result in another election petition, after having already served as one of the counsel for the Petitioners in the Election Petition.
From 2011 to 2016, Godfred Dame was part of the teaching faculty for Company Law and Practice at the Ghana School of Law. In January, 2017, he was appointed as a teacher in Advocacy and Legal Ethics at the Ghana School of Law, a commitment he was unable to fulfill as a result of his appointment as Deputy Attorney-General and Deputy Minister for Justice in President Akufo-Addo’s first term as President.
He also served on very sensitive committees of the Ghana Bar Association contributing to the formulation of policy in the training of lawyers, notable among them being the Pupilage and Juniors Committee, which is concerned with the upholding of standards among junior practitioners of the law. In 2014, he was appointed member of the Ghana Bar Association’s legal team.
Mr. Dame, between 2009 and 2017, served as the Vice-Chairman of the Disciplinary Committee of the Ghana Football Association. Earlier, from 2008 to 2009, he had been Chairman of the Greater-Accra Regional Football Association’s Disciplinary Committee. From 2011 to 2017, he was also a member of the Ghana Football Association Elections Committee.
In 2017, Godfred Dame was appointed Deputy Attorney-General and Deputy Minister for Justice of Ghana, a position he holds to date. In that position, he distinguished himself in his active defence of the Government in various high-profile law suits against the Government and international arbitration involving the Government of Ghana.
He transformed the image of the Attorney-General’s Office into a formidable force in litigation. He is particularly noted for leading the efforts of the Government to recover the money paid businessman, Alfred Agbesi Woyome, ensuring the termination of three mining leases given in favour of Exton Cubic Company Limited, the challenge to the constitutionality of the appointment of Mr. Martin Amidu as Special Prosecutor, the challenge to the creation of new regions in Ghana, the challenge to the compilation of a new register of voters by the National Democratic Congress and many other cases.
He served on the Legal Service Board, the Ministerial Advisory Board of the Ministry of Justice, the Board of the University of Ghana Medical Centre and the Board of the Public Procurement Authority.
He is a Christian and married to Dr. Joycelyn Assimeng Dame. They have two children.
