Remove frustrations in legal education – Akufo-Addo urges stakeholders

Legal education in Ghana is frustrating, Akufo-Addo says

Maintain the momentum of eager minds, the president says

A new General Legal Council and Legal Professions Bill is to be presented to parliament

The president has urged stakeholders in the legal sector to do all they can to reform and remove all the frustrations that exist within Ghana’s current

Read full articlelegal education and legal practice, to make room for even more people to get the opportunities to be educated.

President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo explained that to achieve this, efforts must be made to ensure that the teaching and learning of the law in Ghana is given a free cause, adding that in doing that, the standards should not be countenanced upon, reports asaaseradio.com.

He made this known while addressing 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 law endowment fund, in Accra.

“I am told 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 I was privileged to initiate.

“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,” he said.

Even as a new General Legal Council and Legal Professions Bill is to be presented to parliament, the president has stated that, in the meantime, irrespective of the reforms, it is important that no compromises are brought to the regulatory oversight of the General Legal Council.

“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.

“A reform of the system under which legal education currently operates is necessary to accommodate out current realities. The system we come with, will have to be guided by a strong element of sustainability,” he said.