Petitions delay vetting of Supreme Court judge - designate Pwamang
By Edmund Smith-Asante
 |
| Mr Gabriel Pwamang, judge-designate to the Supreme Court, swearing an oath prior to his vetting at the Parliament House in Accra. |
The Vetting of President John
Mahama’s second nominee to the Supreme Court, Mr Gabriel Pwamang, delayed
for close to three hours yesterday due to a petition and a complaint that had
been forwarded to the Appointments Committee of Parliament.
When sitting finally got underway,
the Chairman of the committee, Mr Ebo Barton-Odro, explained that a meeting was
held with the petitioner in camera to get a clearer understanding of the issues
raised to determine the way forward.
At the end, he said, it had been
decided that the vetting be carried out, while the Committee held on with its
final decision on the nominee until the issues had been thrashed out.
Petitions
According to Mr Barton-Odro, the
petition was from a pastor in respect of the title to a piece of land which had
culminated in the closure of his church on the said land for about 13 months
and had prevented the church from holding services during the period.
“The nominee is counsel for the
other party in the case,” he said.
Mr Barton-Odro said the other matter
was a complaint with the Disciplinary Committee of the General Legal Council.
While alluding to the fact that the
Appointments Committee did not have jurisdiction to handle the two issues that
had been brought before it, information reaching the committee was that the
Legal Council would sit on the matter today, June 4, 2015.
Key Recommendations
Key suggestions made by Mr Pwamang
during his vetting regarding Ghana’s justice and legal systems included a
holistic review of the criminal justice system and the placement of a ceiling
on the number of Supreme Court justices.
Stating that his career objective
was to uphold and ensure the maintenance of the Constitution of Ghana and of
human rights, Mr Pwamang said, “As a nation, we need to be a bit patient. We
cannot abuse the rights of people on the basis of people who have decided not
to come and testify or evidence that is not available.”
He asked for a rewriting of the
rules to enable the prison officer sending convicted prisoners to court to be
able to also hand over remand prisoners who are in the majority at the prisons
to the prosecutor for the court to deal with it.
Responding to questions on some of
the proposals made by the Constitution Review Commission (CRC), of which he was
part, Mr Pwamang said the suggestion to establish the National Development
Planning Commission (NDPC) as an independent governing body was to ensure that
its proposals became binding on all governments.
Another proposal by the CRC was to
remove that injunction which said that majority of the ministers must be taken
from Parliament.
“So the proposal was that the hands
of the President should be freed and the President may appoint ministers from
out of Parliament or from Parliament,” he said.
He said that way, the President
would be able to keep a balance depending on the resources available to
him.
Writer’s email: edmund.asante@graphic.com.gh
This
story was first published by the Daily Graphic on June 4, 2015
Comments
Post a Comment