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A seven-member panel of the Supreme Court, presided over by the Chief Justice, Georgina Theodora Wood, will tomorrow deliver judgement on a landmark case as to whether proposed amendments of certain aspects of the 1992 Constitution being carried out by the Constitution Review Implementation Committee (CRIC) is legal on not.

Last year, US-based Ghanaian professor, Stephen Kwaku Asare and Professor Emmanuel Victor Oware Dankwah filed a suit challenging the legality of the CRIC, which is leading efforts to amend certain aspects of the 1992 Constitution.    

They are, therefore, seeking to nullify the constitution review process currently being undertaken by the CRIC, saying “Parliament is the sole body that can initiate, consider and propose amendments to the constitution.”

The Constitution Review Commission (CRC) was set up by a Constitutional Instrument 2010 (C.I.) 64 in 2010 as a Commission of Inquiry to conduct a consultative review of the constitution and it completed its work and was officially dissolved in 2012.

The exercise, for which an amount of $2.7 million was budgeted, ended with $6.3 million in cash and logistics because of unanticipated additions like consultations from the Diasporan community and the need for more logistics.

However, as CRIC commenced implementation of recommendations, Stephen Kwaku Asare and Professor Emmanuel Victor Oware Dankwah went to the Supreme Court to stop the process.

According to them, Parliament’s power to amend the constitution is not only plenary and exclusive but also cannot be delegated to or usurped by the President, CRIG or CRC.

Professor Asare argues that the President has no power to set up a commission to initiate amendments or draft amendment bills to the constitution as was being done by CRIG.

He, therefore, filed the suit at the Supreme Court challenging the executive arm of government for what he described as “the President’s usurpation of parliamentary powers and misappropriation of Article 278(1).”

The plaintiff wants a declaration that “the Constitution Review Commission of Inquiry Instrument, 2010, C.I. 64 is null, void and of no effect as it contravenes the letter and spirit of Article 289(1) of the 1992 Constitution, in that the effect, if not the intended purpose, of C.I. 64 is to usurp powers that the 1992 Constitution expressly, exclusively and specifically conferred to Parliament.”

He wants another declaration that the powers granted to the President under Article 278(1) to “appoint a commission of inquiry into any matter of public interest” does not include the power to establish a commission to review and propose amendment bills to the constitution where such powers to review and propose amendment bills to the constitution have been expressly, exclusively and specifically conferred to Parliament.”

The plaintiff further wants a declaration that Article 278(1) does not grant the President “an all-purpose commissioning power,” but only gives him the power to commission an independent inquiry to investigate and establish the truth relating to an entity’s affairs, activities or some specific occurrence that is in the public interest.

Prof Asare is praying the highest court of the land to declare that the CRIC set up by the President to finalise amendment bills for both the entrenched and non-entrenched provisions is alien to the constitution, among other reliefs.

It is the contention of the plaintiff that “the constitution can only be amended by its terms,” and added that “Parliament is the sole body that can initiate, consider and propose amendments to the constitution.”