Senior Presidential Advisor and Senior Presidential Aide to President John Dramani Mahama, Joyce Bawah Mogtari, has criticised the Ghana Bar Association (GBA) over its concerns about court sittings during the legal vacation, questioning the basis for what she considers public criticism of the Chief Justice.
Ms. Mogtari argued that judges sitting during the legal vacation is an established practice intended to prevent cases from piling up and to ensure that the administration of justice continues despite the break in the regular court calendar.
Her comments follow recent clarification by Chief Justice Paul Baffoe-Bonnie that the legal vacation does not automatically stop judges from hearing cases.
The Chief Justice has maintained that where a judge is available and willing to work, the vacation period does not prevent that judge from continuing with proceedings. He also explained that the legal vacation is primarily intended as a break for judges and does not impose a blanket restriction on lawyers appearing in court.
Ms. Mogtari, in a Facebook post on Wednesday, August 12, said the practice of assigning judges to sit during the vacation has existed for years.
“From the longest time we have almost always had vacation Judges sitting in the course of the legal vacation. To expedite cases and to reduce the case load,” she wrote.
She questioned why the GBA would publicly challenge an arrangement that, in her view, falls within the administrative responsibilities of the Chief Justice.
“It sounds almost like an affront to the administrative authority of the Chief Justice,” she wrote.
Ms. Mogtari was particularly critical of the manner in which the disagreement had entered the public domain.
She argued that the GBA’s position was unnecessary and could weaken public confidence in the authority of the Chief Justice to manage the judiciary.
“Why would the GBA want to needlessly undermine the work of the Chief Justice, and to do so in such a public manner also sounds very disrespectfully disturbing,” she added.
The disagreement comes against the backdrop of Ghana’s annual legal vacation, which runs from August 1 to September 30 for the superior courts.
The vacation traditionally provides a break from the normal court calendar, although certain courts and judges may continue hearing cases under the arrangements determined by the judiciary.
At the centre of the current debate is whether the existence of the legal vacation should prevent judges from continuing with proceedings or whether individual judges may sit where they are available and willing to do so.
The Chief Justice’s position is that the vacation does not constitute a blanket shutdown of judicial proceedings.
Ms. Mogtari’s intervention has now added a political voice to what began as a legal and administrative debate, with her defending the Chief Justice’s authority and questioning the GBA’s approach to the matter.
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