By Benjamin A. Commey
Accra, April 27, GNA – Mr Martin Kpebu, a Private Legal Practitioner, has called for a legislation to regularise the offices of the First and Second Ladies to make them more effective.
His call follows the Supreme Court’s ruling, which declared payment of salaries and emoluments to the spouses of President and Vice-President as unconstitutional.
The Apex Court, in its ruling on Wednesday, April 24, 2024, declared that the spouses of the President and Vice-president were not article 71 office holders and, therefore, could not be paid emoluments.
Speaking on TV3’s “The Key Point” programme, on Saturday, monitored by the Ghana News Agency, Mr Kpebu called for the regularisation of those offices to allow State funding and make them more viable.
He explained that the offices of the spouses of the President and Vice-President played crucial role in the governance of the country and could, therefore, not be left to operate as humanitarian offices.
He also noted that the offices of the First and Second Ladies, as they stood, were already being run with State funds, stressing that constitutional amendments were required to make provisions for them to ensure their legality.
“Let’s have the conversation properly, now that we all know that whoever comes to office in January 2025, as for this our constitution we must amend it, then we can look at what we can do to include them so that at least there will be some legality. As you said, practically they have their own offices, security guards, so many cars, etc. Obviously not from their husbands’ pockets but from the State coffers.
“So, if we’ve done this for so long and we think that yes, it should continue, and it appears it may have to continue, then let’s do it because they do help their spouses in running the country. I mean, it’s a fact, whether you like it or not, because there are certain places, if let’s say the President doesn’t attend and his wife does, it suffices in a way, I’m not saying everywhere, but there are some quarters if the First Lady goes they are happy that’s okay, the First Lady is in there because they know that she can whisper one or two to the husband,” Mr Kpebu explained.
Professor Ransford Gyampo, a Political Science Lecturer at the University of Ghana, speaking on the same programme, however, rejected such a proposal, indicating that funding those offices would put huge financial burden on the State.
He also explained that the executive had too much power and that legalising those offices would further extend the frontiers of its power rather than curtail them.
“If we go with the idea that well, let us pay First Ladies Second Ladies and all that you are making them also powerful in a manner that expands the frontiers of the exercise of powers in Ghana and I think that it is not something we have to condone,” he said.
He added that “instead of saving money, we are always looking for avenues to spend.”
“I’m not attacking or looking at any particular President’s wife or Vice-President’s wife. I’m just saying that it is a bad practice, we should be thinking about saving money using the money judiciously and wisely to bring about development in the physical quality of life.”
GNA
