The Majority Chief Whip, Rockson-Nelson Dafeamekpor, has made a case for a radical overhaul of legal education in Ghana.
The South Dayi MP said the country must break the monopoly of the Ghana School of Law and allow accredited university law faculties to train lawyers directly.
Speaking on Joy News’ PM Express on Tuesday, the MP, who is also a lawyer, said the time has come for “the democratisation of legal education” after years of what he called a corrupted and contentious admissions process.
“The Legal Education Bill was long in coming,” he said. “We waged this war from about 2018 when intake to the law school became acrimonious, contentious and eventually corrupted.”
According to him, evidence emerged that some people who never sat for the law school entrance exams were admitted.
“I’m not the one saying this,” he stated. “It was their own General Legal Council’s disciplinary committee that established this fact—11 students. Even though my information is that they were over 33. But for the records, to minimise the impact, they said 11.”
“What became of those 11 students who were admitted through the back door? We are yet to know. But we shall uncover it,” he added.
Mr Dafeamekpor said the current model, which centralises the training of lawyers at the Ghana School of Law in Accra, is no longer sustainable or justifiable.
“Already, the faculties are calling themselves law schools anyway. What becomes of a law school when you can’t train lawyers?”
He proposed that every faculty accredited to run academic LLB programmes should also be allowed to train lawyers, leading to a professional qualification.
The Ghana School of Law, he stressed, should no longer hold a monopoly.
“Makola will become just one of many. It will admit its own students. Train them for the academic phase. Train them in the practical phase. And when they are ready, they go and face the bar.”
He explained that the new system would introduce two bar examinations annually, one in January and another in July, administered by the General Legal Council.
“When you pass the January bar, you are called to the bar in March or April. If you pass the July one, you are called in September or October. So that we can have as many lawyers as we want.”
According to him, the professional training phase can be flexible and tailored to the needs of students.
“Depending on the content, it can be one year, one and a half years, or two years maximum. If somebody is focused, the person should be able to complete it in a year. Because it’s practical courses.”
He pushed back against the idea that all lawyers must enter private practice.
“That’s the erroneous impression in the minds of a lot of people. There are more people you call to the bar who are not in practice. They are into corporate law and other fields. And we need them.”
He said Ghana’s public institutions, especially at the local level, need legally trained minds.
“If you enter a lot of assemblies in this country, you see that you need lawyers, not necessarily practitioners, but people with legal minds to guide you.”
When asked by host Evans Mensah when the Legal Education Bill will be passed, Mr Dafeamekpor responded confidently.
“Why not? I’m the Majority Chief Whip. We are even minded to move this under a certificate of urgency. It is one of our major political promises—and we will deliver it.”
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