LAW AND PUBLIC LEGAL EDUCATION - GHANA

LESSONS FROM THE 2019 SOUTH AFRICAN ELECTIONS IN RELATION TO THE PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION ELCTORAL SYSTEM By Ernesto Yeboah Leader, Economic Fighters League (Fighters) 2019 While the 2019 South African election has proved pivotal in signalling the beginning of the end for the African National Congress (ANC), one of the oldest liberation parties in Africa, the future looks bright for the radical Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF). It was the only party that grew in all the provinces of the country. Even in the socially conservative province of KwaZulu-Natal, which in the past has proved extremely difficult to penetrate for new parties, its support grew extraordinarily from 1.9% in 2014 to almost 10% in 2019. This, according to analysts, has come at the expense of the ANC, which lost nearly 10%. The official opposition, the Democratic Alliance (DA) also lost 5 seats at the National Assembly. Today the EFF is now the second largest party in three provinces, Limpopo, Mpumalanga and ...

Alex Mould writes Banking Crises Part 1: The role of Bank of Ghana (BoG) THE REGULATOR  IS TO BLAME The current crises within Ghana’s banking sector has left us all perplexed; with many unanswered questions. On one hand we are being asked not to blame the current Governor of BoG since he is only implementing recommendations that he received when he took over from the previous Governor. So that means the previous administration’s Governor had set in motion a plan of action to be implemented based on findings from BoG’s investigations. Yet on the other hand we are being told that the previous regime is to blame for this current crises. The real questions are: - when were these investigation carried out? - what were the findings - when were the actions to remedy these findings meant to be implemented? - why had these actions not been implemented? Let’s backtrack a bit to understand some of the history behind it. From the reports it seems that a provisional licens...

The second scramble for Africa beckons. This time with some difference. Only two players. After Brexit and its painful effect, the UK is desperately looking for other weaker trade partners so that it can hold on to it's weakened dominace. On the Other side, the EU wants to be even stronger and keep their dominance. Africa is the target for this greatness of course. The USA has shown Europe the wrong signal with Donald Trump in charge. UK promising £20m investment in Ghana. Yes Investment. I don't know when they will recup their investment and how much it would have further depleted our resources. Germany also promising to build a VW assembly plant. Just a day after UKs promise. Both of them have left Ghana to other African countries. What is the use of the AU? These are all good. But I dare say will only benefit the politicians and not the people. Where is our 1D1F (One district one factory project)? Why has the Central Bank used its monitoring power to reduce confiden...

Last week, a 70 year old man died after about 7 hospitals in Accra had refused to admit him with the same reason…. “ No Bed ”. There was no vacancy to admit the man for treatment. So his family traveled  for several hours through traffic and bad roads in some instances hoping to have him given care. But alas, he gave up the ghost. Ooo the sting of death could not wait for the excuses from the nation’s hospitals. The Poor old man is gone. Jesus is not here to raise him again… at least, not immediately like the case of Lazarus in the Bible. Life once lost cannot be gained again. It’s as if this is the first time this has happened. Perhaps, his family has some media connections so his death has become the symbol of sacrifice that has awakened people to call for an end to the ‘No Bed’ syndrome. I am at least happy about it especially because the phenomenon is gaining attention and may be given attention by government and leaders in the health sector. Somewhere in April...

On Tuesday 20th March 2018, news broke that Ghana’s cabinet has approved an agreement between Government of Ghana and the United States of America (USA) to allow the latter to establish what has been termed a military base on the soils of the former. This awakened vehement disagreement from citizens who were largely opposed to the move. Various arguments have been cited for the mass disagreement from the public. In spite of this, Parliament within 3 days has approved the agreement. Of course the minority NDC which has in fact signed similar agreements in the past, staged a walk out during the approval just to score political points. They have vowed to reverse the agreement in 2021 if they should win the elections of 2020. As a social Prophet, I prophesy that if they win, they would just like the NPP did on the GITMO 2 matter, make a big U turn and give reasons why they cannot reverse. The real problem with our parliament is that the majority is always overly political. They refu...

As usual, my alarm loudly disrupted my sleep at about 4:50AM. I had to get up for work. By 6am we had set off and I was a bit angry because I felt my sweetheart had caused our lateness. I am usually not a happy man in the mornings by the way. Leaving home late in Accra means, you are likely to endure a very uncomfortable traffic for hours before getting to office. The distance between Adenta (where I live) and Asylum Down (where I work) can be travelled within 20 minutes when there is no traffic, yet it usually take an hour and a few minutes for us to get to work when we leave before 6am. Leaving home at 6am or later would mean you could take close to two hours to work. As we drove through the bumpy dusty lane to join the main road, I put on the radio. CITI FM had given me another reason to worry. This time not for my usual egoistic personal wellbeing. I was worried about street children in Accra. It’s not as if I have not always been worried about them. I do chip some of th...

 Serving as the president of a nation is one of the highest jobs anyone can ever get in a lifetime. Not only is it high in power, but also in prestige, respect, networking and if you like spirituality. The president of any nation is at the time of his term the image and persona reflector of that nation. The endurance of the 1992 republican constitution of Ghana has blessed Ghana with three living former presidents: John Mahama, John Kuffour and John Rawlings. The theme for this article is centred on happenings soon after the first non-John named individual was sworn into office as president of the republic under the 1992 constitution. The controversy started with the immediate past president, John Dramani Mahama who had made a request to the transition team that as part of his end of Service Benefit (ESB) he would prefer that he is allowed to stay in the official residence of the Vice President of the Republic instead of the republic building a new house for him as recomme...