Supreme Court fixes May 4 date to rule on payment of allowance to presidential spouses

Spouses of President and Vice President to earn annual allowance of $45,000

Allowance for First and Second Ladies described as unconstitutional in legal challenge

Ghana’s apex court has fixed Wednesday, May 4, 2022, to rule on a suit challenging the payment of monthly allowances to the spouses of the country’s President and Vice President.

The Parliament of Ghana in 2021 voted on a committee report to give wives of the president and the vice president a cumulative amount of about $45,000 over a period of four years as allowance.

The proposed allowance recommended by the Prof. Ntiamoah-Baidu committee was pegged at the salary level of a Cabinet Minister.

The seeming public discontent that greeted the proposal led two opposition Members of Parliament; Rockson Nelson Etse Dafeamekpor of South Dayi and Dr. Clement Apak of Builsa South, and a private citizen, Frederick Nii Commey, to seek a pronouncement from the Supreme Court.

It is the case of the three that the Prof. Ntiamoah-Baidu Committee overstepped its bounds when it made recommendations in respect of salaries, allowances payable, facilities, and privileges not just limited to Article 71 office holders under the 1992 Constitution, but also extended to spouses of the president and vice president, as well as spouses of former presidents and vice presidents.

The legal representative for the plaintiffs, Lawyer Nii Kpakpo Samoa Addo, has argued that the 1st and 2nd ladies are not Article 71 Office Holders and has therefore prayed the Supreme Court to declare those portions of the Committee’s report relating to them as unconstitutional, as such, null, void, and of no effect.

The Committee maintains that the payment of allowances to First and Second ladies whether past or present is a purely humanitarian act and which has no legal basis.