[2023]DLCA17735 • February 16, 2023 • Court of Appeal
THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL AND THE GENERAL LEGAL COUNCIL vs. PRINCE GANAKU & 4 OTHERS
The General Legal Council (GLC), responsible for regulating legal education in Ghana, conducts an annual entrance examination for admission to the law school through its Independent Examination Committee (IEC). Candidates must sign an undertaking accepting the examination results as final with no opportunity for review or remarking. The respondents, holders of LLB degrees, sat for the 2019/2020 entrance exam but failed. One respondent requested remarking, which was declined. They challenged the policy as arbitrary and a breach of their constitutional right to administrative justice under Article 23 of the 1992 Constitution.
read moreJUDGMENT ADJEI-FRIMPONG, J.A.: We are in this suit to address some questions of constitutional and administrative law importance. The statutory authority to make decisions in the exercise of discretionary powers remains an indispensable component of modern state governance. In this jurisdiction, the constitution and a number of statutes confer broad discretionary powers on various administrative bodies and officials. There is therefore a constant interaction between the citizenry and the repositories of administrative discretion. Inevitably, the exercise of administrative discretion impinges on human rights and other legally recognized interests. Judicial control by constitutional and statutory means, remains an effective tool to check the exercise of duties and powers of such bodies and officials so as to preserve and protect the rights and interests of those thereby affected. Whether or not a particular body or official has exercised its administrative discretion in manner war...