By: Kwame Bediako
The Attorney-General (A-G) and Minister of Justice, Dr. Dominic Ayine has announced a major overhaul of Ghana’s legal education system by abolishing the centralized admissions process at the Ghana School of Law in Makola, Accra. Instead of the current system, universities offering the LLB degree will introduce a one-year practical Bar Practice Programme as part of qualifying for professional legal practice.
Graduates will thereafter sit for a new national bar examination to be admitted to the Bar for legal practice.
Speaking at a press conference in Accra on Monday, July 28, 2025, Dr. Ayine revealed that a new Legal Education Bill, which has been finalized and will be submitted to Cabinet in August, outlines these changes.
The bill seeks to decentralize legal education by empowering accredited universities to run the practical training internally, replacing the bottlenecked and exclusionary Ghana School of Law admissions system.
“The bill will abolish the Ghana School of Law system,” he said, explaining that universities will provide practical legal education and students will write a national bar exam modeled after the Institute of Chartered Accountants’ system.
For decades, thousands of LLB graduates from both public and private institutions have struggled to gain admission to the Ghana School of Law despite holding qualifying degrees, resulting in significant frustrations and a restricted pathway to legal practice.
Dr. Ayine emphasized that the new system is designed to be inclusive, merit-based and to broaden access without compromising professional standards. “We are shifting from exclusion to inclusion, ensuring all qualified LLB holders have a clear and merit-based path to becoming lawyers,” he stated.
Under the new framework, law graduates will complete a three-year LLB program followed by a one-year clinical legal education or Bar Practice Programme at their respective universities.
Afterward, they will sit a standardized national bar exam that will qualify them for call to the Bar and professional legal practice.
Despite expanding access to training, the government clarified that it will not fund professional legal education in private universities. The Attorney-General submitted the final draft of the bill to his deputy, Dr. Justice Srem-Sai, for review on July 27 before the announcement.
