The respected retired Justice of the Supreme Court, Justice Prof. Samuel Kofi Date-Bah has waded into the never ending debate of the nature of Ghana's legal education system. The distinguished legal scholar called to the bar in 1969 has said Professional Legal Education should be taken to the law faculties.

The former law teacher who trained lawyers and students in Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria and overseas in visiting academic positions however said there ought to be sufficient logistics and capacity to provide Professional Legal Education at the law faculties before a change in system is done. Ghana's legal education system follows the English system of Education. It is compartmentalized into academic legal education provided at the Universities and professional legal education which is offered by the Ghana School of Law Headquartered in Makola, Accra.

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Prof. Date-Bah made these remarks at the Life Time Achievement Award instituted by the UPSA Law School to honour outstanding personalities who have contributed to the Ghanaian Society. He noted that, the call to adopt the American system of legal training may not bode well for our system as the J.D awarded by American universities is not of the same nature as LLBs awarded by Ghanaian law schools.

[Pictured: Justice Prof. Date-Bah being presented with a citation at the award ceremony held in his honour]

Adding on to discussion of Ghana's legal education, Justice Date-Bah said law faculties in Ghana should blend their law education curriculum with humanities education to enrich lawyers for successful legal practice.

https://youtu.be/Qj60MO6ig08?si=9pMrysyzXFlx4d7v

AfCFTA

The former member of the Independent Examination Board of the General Legal Council, a former member of the Ghana Law Reform Committee and a former Special Advisor (Legal) at the Commonwealth Secretariat adviced law faculties to sponsor students to learn civil law in the wake of the African Continental Free Trade Agreement. The motivation for this move recommended to the faculties is to facilitate trade with Francophone and Portuguese speaking countries who belong to the civil law tradition. His recommendation is reflective of the position taken by Dr. Poku Adusei in his article published in the 2017 edition of the Global Journal of Comparative Law where he recommends a transsystemic Ghanaian legal education. That is, Ghanaian legal education should have elements from the various legal traditions.