Godfred Yeboah Dame, the Attorney General and Minister of Justice, has made a passionate appeal to Parliament to pass the criminal and other offenses (procedure) amendment bill with has been laid before the house as it will help improve criminal prosecutions in Ghana.
He made the call in his address at the annual conference of the Ghana Bar Association, (GBA) which took place at the Great Hall of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) on Monday, 9 September 2024.
“Without a doubt, the most far-reaching reform of criminal law practice in this country will be achieved when the law that will enhance the speed of adjudication of criminal cases and address the problems associated with the jury system is enacted. I therefore call on Parliament, to as a matter of urgency, pass the Criminal and Other Offences (Procedure) (Amendment) Bill sponsored by the Office of the Attorney-General and Ministry of Justice and approved by Cabinet, which I laid in Parliament on 14th March, 2024.
“Our criminal practice continues to be steeped in the very old and traditional ways of doing things known to the common law jurisdiction, even where the masters of the tradition have long reformed. For instance, in Britain and the United States, interlocutory appeals in criminal practice are significantly controlled and virtually eliminated,” the Attorney General stated.
“Further, not every verdict in every criminal trial is appealable all the way to the highest court. Whilst mindful of the constitutional imperatives in our legal system, the Bill seeks to place due restrictions on interlocutory appeals by postponing the filing of same to only after a determination by the trial court of a submission of no case, scrapping of trials on indictment except where the offence is punishable by death or life imprisonment, providing for examination of witnesses by video conferencing, adoption of proceedings in criminal matters, day-to-day trial of all criminal cases except where same is impracticable and reform of the jury system to reduce the list of exemptions from jury service, the composition of the jury (by addition of alternate jurors), etc.,” the Attorney General added.
In his statement, the Attorney General noted that his office is also in the process of preparing a new Legal Profession Bill as part of measures to comprehensively, and in a more sustainable way, address among other things, issues relating to access to legal education, rules on call to the Bar and regulation of professional conduct.
“I am, however, happy to note that in the past four years, we have recorded the highest admission of persons to study law and the biggest call of persons to the bar in the nation’s history. In all, over 3,000 persons have been called to the bar since 2021. In 2022 alone, over one thousand (1000) lawyers were called to the bar, the highest in the country’s history at that time.
“In 2023, this record was broken with the admission of 1,286 lawyers at both the Main Call and Mini Call ceremonies. I, as Attorney-General in 2021, personally ensured the admission of some 499 students into the Ghana School of Law by presenting a petition to the General Legal Council, a situation for which the Bar President still holds a grudge against me,” Dame said.
*It is correct to say that for many of the junior lawyers, your presence in this room has been made possible by the positive decisions to broaden access to the legal profession by the Akufo-Addo administration. We believe in broadening access to legal education whilst preserving standards and quality, cherished values without which the legal profession will lose its relevance to society. With these giant strides, I am confident that the future of the legal profession is bigger, brighter, and better, he further stated.
