Story: Franklin ASARE-DONKOH
A Private legal practitioner, Professor Stephen Kwaku Asare, has described as obnoxious the undertaking prepared by the Ghana Legal Council (GLC), for prospective students of the Ghana School of Law to sign before taking their entrance exam.
He is, therefore, urging the general public to name, shame, and chase out GLC members from office.
The said undertaking, which has raised eyebrows on various social media platforms, states that students who sign the document are to accept the decision of the GLC without question or challenge.
“Thus, the decision of the General Legal Council in respect of the published results of the entrance examination shall be final. No request for re-marking of scripts, re-tallying of scores, or review or marks shall be accepted. Candidates cannot also request to see their marked answer scripts or the marking schemes used for marking the questions,” the undertaking reads.
Reacting to the agreement in a series of Facebook posts, the Private Legal Practitioner called on prospective students of the School of Law to boycott the entrance examinations.
He further called for the dissolution of the Ghana Legal Council board.
“The GLC members must be named, shamed, and chased out of town for their pre-colonial views on legal education,” Prof. Asare reiterated.
Apart from Prof. Asare, another person who has hit hard on the GLC is the Vice President of IMANI Africa, Mr. Kofi Bentil.
Mr. Bentil in his reaction to the proposed undertaking said, “This is patently illegal, immoral and unconscionable. This will age badly and be a byword and reference point for bad, oppressive leadership. Posterity will judge all who presided over this terrible opaque and insensitive system badly.”
Mr. Selorm Branttie, also of IMANI Africa, described the undertaking as indiscriminate.
“This is what the study of law has been reduced to. And you expect the law profession to blossom and grow when we cannot even check the arbitrariness of those who say they are marking exams?
Where in this world are students not allowed to have lecturers justify the reason why they are given certain marks, especially when the questions aren’t multiple choice?” he wrote.
He further questioned the silence of the Ghana Bar Association on the matter while bemoaning the prevalence of elite capture in the country.
“And the Ghana Bar Association (which is only active when non-NPP governments are in power) sits down for this travesty of justice to take place? You spend thousands of cedis and countless hours on your tuition only to be told that the process of grading you is completely opaque, and not only that, you cannot seek redress if you feel cheated.
It’s like depositing money for a car to be delivered to you, they tell you they are billing you for a new Mercedes S Class, and yet, if they deliver a 10-year-old Toyota Vitz, you have no right to complain because they chose what car to give you. Such nonsense. This country naa it’s not worth fighting for. We deny constitutional rights to push elitism and a senior boys club and nobody lifts a damn finger!” he retorted.
