The Attorney-General, Godfred Yeboah Dame, has directed the General Legal Council (GLC) to admit the 499 students who had earlier been denied admission to the Ghana School of Law.
His direction follows two letters from the President, Akufo-Addo, requesting that he [Mr Dame] makes “the necessary intervention to the General Legal Council, on behalf of the 499 students, to address the issue and advise that the students be admitted into the Ghana School of Law.”
According to the Attorney-General, after careful examination of the petitions, he observed that despite the GLC not advertising any pass mark or threshold before the exams, it was widely assumed the 50% general pass mark applied in 2020 would apply this year.
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“Reasonableness and fairness required the GLC to have communicated the alteration in the process of admission of students into the Ghana School of Law.
“This became more imperative when an account is taken of the immense public interest in the admission processes of the School of Law,” he said in a letter dated November 1.
The failure of the GLC to do this, he said, had “created unwarranted doubts about the transparency of the process.”
To remedy the situation, the Attorney-General has proffered three alternative solutions from which the Council to choose.
The first option demands that the GLC grants the 499 students deferred admission into the Ghana School of Law with effect from May 2022.
“A special provision can be made for the first year professional law course by candidates already admitted to run from October 2021 to April 2022. Thus, the 499 candidates may undertake their programme from May 2022 and ending in November 2022.
“Arrangements will have to be put in place for the two sets of candidates to undertake their pupilage and be called to the Bar at a common date in the next two years,” he said.
The second option demands that the GLC grants the 499 students immediate admission effective November 2021.
He stated that provision should be “made for the organisation of classes in a way as to be able to cater for the needs of the entire candidates of the Part One Course of the Professional Law Programme.”
The final option demands that the GLC conducts a special examination in November 2021 to allow the 499 students to justify their admission into the Law School for the 2021/22 academic year.
“Such examination may be on ‘essay questions’ which properly assess the ability of candidates to reason legally and resolve practical problems,” Godfred Dame explained.
Meanwhile, he has further advised that in the future when the GLC is once again about to conduct an entrance exam for admission into the Ghana School of Law, the GLC should clearly advertise the pass mark to ensure transparency and accountability.
Source: myjoyonline.com
