Stay away from the Judiciary – Sosu warns Dame

Francis-Xavier Sosu, Member of Parliament for Medina Constituency, has cautioned the Attorney-General, Godfred Yeboah Dame to desist from any involvement with the Judicial arm of government.

The MP in an open letter asserted that the recent public statements from the Attorney General suggest that the AG is “in bed with the Judiciary”.

“Rule of Law is seriously endangered under this administration and unfortunately the posturing and public statements of the Attorney-General who is the Principal Legal Advisor to Government, only feeds into the perception that the AG is in bed with the Judiciary.

“Let me advise the A-G to stay away from the Judiciary. Judicial power and administration of Justice must be independent and impartial and definitely not subject to the public advice of the AG,” a portion of the letter reads.

For this reason, the Deputy Ranking Member of the Constitutional Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Committee of Parliament is calling for the decoupling of the Office of Attorney General from the Ministry of Justice to be fast-tracked.

Sosu believes this will also reduce the tendency of ‘secret and illegal conspiracy’ between the AG and the Judiciary.

“As Deputy Ranking Member of the Constitutional Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Committee of Parliament, I am more convinced that we must fast-track the decoupling of the Office of Attorney General and Ministry of Justice. While this will not necessarily completely remove the tendency of collusions, it will be the most reasonably probable way of reducing such duplicity,” he noted in his letter.

To him, lawyers owe a duty to be loyal to the rule of law and the Constitution of Ghana and not the Judiciary.

The NDC legislator argued, for there to be effective justice and confidence in the justice system, “we must rather be advising all institutions of the state, particularly institutions of Justice such as The Ghana Police Service, Attorney-General and Ministry of Justice and the Judiciary to assert and reaffirm their constitutional independence not only in words but also in actions.”

He observed the fundamental human right to hold the judiciary accountable through whatever applicable means deemed fit.

“Justice emanates from the people and the people have fundamental rights under the 1992 Constitution to hold the Judiciary accountable through mainstream media and social media, whichever may be applicable. The people do that through strict scrutiny of judgments and actions of the Judiciary,” Francis-Xavier Sosu noted.