Partial or Total Separation: What is Your Proposal for the 2025 Constitutional Review Commiittee?

Considerable number of Ghanaians who have been calling for the review of the 1992 4th Republican Constitution suggest total separation of the legislature from the executive. For these individuals, no minister of state should be appointed from Parliament.

This proposal runs contrary to the current constitutional arrangements that bind the President to appoint more than half of his cabinet ministers from the Ghanaian legislature - Parliament. Those proposing for the total separation of powers are doing so for a number of reasons.

They believe absolute separation of powers will make the legislature more effective in its oversight responsibilities over the work of the executive. As much as they could be right, they may not be entirely right as long as party whips will still exist to ensure that Members of Parliament debate and vote on party lines.

Absolute separation of powers will also afford the ministers of state enough time, thereby making them more effective in the discharge of their executive functions. This stems from the fact that they will not be burdened with parliamentary responsibilities since they are not MPs.

The practice of appointing his cabinet minsters from outside Parliament will also create opportunity for the President to appoint experts. This is due to the fact that there may be more experts in the larger population than there could be in Parliament. Such experts may bring their expertise on board and promote effective administration of the country.

The danger with this, however, is that these experts may turn to be insensitive to the plight of the electorates since they were not elected by the voters. Consequently, they may end up adopting policies or executing projects that do not resonate with the needs of the people. As experts, they may be tempted to feel that they know better. The concomitant political effect of such attitude will be the fury of the voters, which will be vented in subsequent elections.

From the above analysis, do you think the Constitution Review Committee should maintain the current constitutional arrangements, where the President is required to appoint more than half of his cabinet from Parliament or that system must pave way for total separation of powers with checks and balance in place?

The author is an Information Officer with the Information Services Department and a columnist with Modern Ghana, an esteemed online news porttal