Former Registrar of the Ghana School of Law and member of the Conference of Law Deans, Nana Osei Bonsu, has welcomed the government’s move to expand access to legal education and practice but cautioned against rushing its implementation.
Speaking to Citi News, Nana Osei Bonsu noted that while the yet-to-be-implemented policy is a step in the right direction, its current framework—which reportedly considers only four public universities—is inadequate to address the long-standing challenge of restricted access to professional legal training.
“It appears the government is trying to rush the process, and I think that a lot of stakeholder consultation should be done because people in the legal education field are more than those in cabinet, and we will be able to give our input into it,” he said.
For years, many LLB graduates from both public and private universities have faced challenges gaining admission to the Ghana School of Law, the country’s sole institution authorised to offer professional legal training.
Attorney General Dr. Dominic Ayine recently announced plans to replace the current centralised system with a new framework under which universities offering the LLB programme will run a one-year practical Bar Practice Programme. Graduates would then sit a national bar examination to qualify for admission to the Bar.
However, the draft policy before the Cabinet, according to the Conference of Law Deans, limits participation to four public universities.
Nana Osei Bonsu urged the government to include private universities in the new arrangement, stressing that exclusion would undermine efforts to increase access.
“The main point is that we want to increase access, but if we want to increase access and we don’t accredit many faculties but a few, then the problem will still exist because I have heard that they are only going to accredit four government faculties leaving the private sector out,” he said.
He further warned that the policy, if not inclusive, could “jettison the investment of private universities,” and proposed a transitional period to ensure smooth implementation.
Vice Chancellor of KAAF University, Dr. Francis Acheampong, also called for greater inclusion of private universities, insisting that “private universities have the capacity to train professional lawyers and must be considered in key government decisions.”
He expressed concern over what he described as the “seeming neglect of private schools” in policymaking.
