President Nana Akufo-Addo has noted that there was a dramatic surge in the interest in the legal profession and the study of the law in the aftermath of Ghana’s first-ever full-blown presidential election petition in 2013 which was fully televised and which he was a privilege to initiate.
According to him, “If the search for justice in the cause of law can motivate people to aspire to be lawyers, we should be able to maintain the momentum of these eager minds and not frustrate them” President Akufo-Addo said.
President Akufo-Addo has made a Clarion call on all stakeholders in the legal education and legal practice space in the country to do everything within their power to reform legal education in the nation and to remove all frustrations in the way of law students.
Addressing attendees of the opening ceremony of a four-day international conference on the future of legal education in Ghana/Africa and the launch of the University of Ghana school of a law endowment fund, held at the school of the law conference hall, today the 29th of November 2021, President Akufo-Addo said every effort must to made to ensure that the teaching and learning of the law in Ghana is given a free cause while ensuring that the highest of standards are maintained.
The President observed that irrespective of the reforms that are being worked on currently ahead of the submission of a new General Legal Council and Legal Professions Bill to Parliament, it is important that the regulatory oversight of the General Legal Council is not compromised.
“I believe that even if the new legal professional act which is under consideration provides for a multiplicity of law schools to regulate the teaching of the professional examinations to break the monopoly of the General Legal Council in that regard, there can be no substitute for the General Legal Council being responsible for the maintenance of standards in the new system,” Akufo-Addo said.
“A reform of the system under which legal education currently operates is necessary to accommodate our current realities. The system we come with will have to be guided by a strong element of sustainability” President Akufo-Addo added.
Source: Mybrytfmonline.com/Kofi Atakora
