Chairman of the Constitution Review Committee, Professor Henry Kwasi Prempeh, says calls for the outright abolition of the Council of State are not sufficient and must be backed by deeper reflection and alternatives for reform.
Speaking on JoyNews’ on Saturday, May 3, Prof. Prempeh acknowledged that a significant number of submissions called for the scrapping of the Council of State, citing its ineffectiveness, lack of transparency, and limited influence on key national decisions.
However, the constitutional law expert argued that abolishing an existing institution merely because it isn’t functioning well in its current form is not a compelling enough reason without considering potential reforms that could make it more effective.
“The posture that I have taken is that it is not sufficient to call for the abolition of an existing structure in the Constitution if the call for abolition is predicated largely or solely on the fact that it is not working as structured,” he pointed out.
He suggested that the Council’s lack of impact may be due to structural flaws such as opaque operations, excessive presidential influence through appointments, and non-binding advisory powers. Instead of doing away with the Council entirely, he proposed reviewing its composition, making its operations more transparent, and strengthening its role by making its advice binding in certain areas.
Prof. Prempeh emphasised that the Committee is focused on long-term institutional improvements and is open to recommendations that repurpose the Council into a more functional and credible advisory body.
“The argument should not just be about getting rid of it, but about how we redesign it to serve the purpose it was meant for.”
“Our task is not just to listen to what is broken,” Prof. Prempeh said, “but to ask how we can make things work better. So rather than taking a binary position of abolish or retain, I’m more interested in a middle ground: retain, but modify.”