Dismiss suits seeking interpretation on presidential term limit — Kwadwo Poku urges Supreme Court

A member of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) national communications team, Kwadwo Poku, has urged the Supreme Court to dismiss suits seeking an interpretation of Ghana’s presidential term limit without hearing them.

He argued that Article 66(2) of the 1992 Constitution is clear and contains no ambiguity requiring the intervention of the apex court.

His comments come amid two separate suits filed at the Supreme Court seeking clarification on whether the constitutional two-term limit applies only to consecutive terms or bars a person from contesting again after serving two non-consecutive terms.

The first of the two cases was filed by Ganiwu Alhassan, a teacher from Kpandai in the Northern Region, against the Attorney-General.

He is asking the Supreme Court to declare that a person who has served two separate, non-consecutive terms as President remains eligible to contest the presidency again.

The second case was filed by Daily Searchlight editor Kenneth Kwabena Agyei Kuranchie.

It also seeks an interpretation of Article 66(2), particularly whether a president who has served one term, lost a subsequent election and later returned to office can serve two further consecutive terms.

Article 66(2) states that a person “shall not be elected to hold office as President of Ghana for more than two terms.”

The interpretation being sought has generated a political debate because President John Dramani Mahama has already served as president from 2012 to 2017 and returned to office in January 2025.

Speaking on Accra-based JoyNews' AM Show on Tuesday, August 18, the NPP Communicator said the Supreme Court should reject the cases because there was no real dispute requiring constitutional interpretation.

“I think the Supreme Court, looking at the temperature in the country, the justices of the Supreme Court should just dismiss this outright and not even hear it. There's no point hearing it,” he said.