The Ghana Bar Association (GBA), has expressed strong disapproval of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo’s use of their conference platform for political campaigning against former President John Mahama.
The GBA accused President Akufo-Addo of making unfortunate remarks that sought to influence voters against John Mahama due to recent comments he made regarding the judiciary and the Airbus scandal investigation.
The Public Relations Officer of the GBA, Saviour Kudze, emphasized the association’s condemnation of the president’s appeal to voters and stated that their platform should not be utilized for political campaign purposes. Kudze underlined that the GBA would not tolerate any attempts to politicize their platform.
“What the president said today is rather unfortunate and we condemn it. The aspect we condemn has to do with his appeal to Ghanaians by way of campaigning of a sort to vote against Mahama just because he made a comment that President Akufo-Addo has allegedly packed the court with NPP-aligned judges as described by President Mahama.”
“And also bringing up the issue of the investigations allegedly linking former President Mahama to the Airbus scandal. Our platform is not supposed to be used for that and then we condemn that leg of President Akufo-Addo’s comment. We are not going to allow anybody to use our platform to campaign politically for or against the opponent.”
However, the GBA clarified that they would not issue an apology to Mahama, as they had previously condemned him for similar behavior.
President Akufo-Addo had earlier criticized Mahama for alleging that the judiciary had been stacked with judges aligned with the ruling NPP party. He characterized Mahama’s comments as a “very dangerous” and a “brazen attack on the independence of the judiciary.”
While the GBA shared concerns about the independence of the judiciary, they disagreed with the president’s approach. They stressed that safeguarding judicial independence is best achieved by ensuring that all politicians, regardless of their affiliations, uphold the rule of law and respect the separation of powers.
“The GBA believes that the best way to protect the independence of the judiciary is to ensure that all politicians, regardless of their party affiliation, respect the rule of law and the separation of powers,” the statement said.
The GBA called upon all politicians to refrain from making political statements during their conferences and to uphold the neutrality of the legal profession.
