Selective justice claims false, lawyers only trying to delay cases — Deputy AG

He described the allegation as “completely false”, insisting that several judges across the country have been designated as vacation judges and are currently conducting cases.

“It is completely false. There are so many judges that are doing vacation court and there are other cases that we are conducting oral cases which are not in the vacation because their judges in those courts have not been appointed as vacation court and they’ve vacated,” he said.

“So it is a false allegation they are making.”

His comments come amid a growing dispute between the judiciary and the Ghana Bar Association (GBA) over the conduct of court proceedings during the legal vacation, which runs from August 1 to September 30.

Justice Srem-Sai maintained that lawyers who have legitimate difficulties appearing during the vacation are not without recourse.

He said counsel who cannot attend a particular sitting should appear before the court, explain the circumstances and formally seek an adjournment.

“If a lawyer has a challenge which will prevent him from conducting a case on any day, what you do is to come to court and tell the court your reason, and the court will understand and grant you adjournment,” he explained.

He rejected the suggestion that lawyers can simply decline to practise because the courts are on vacation.

“But to sit at home and in your office and declare that because of legal vacation you have decided that you won’t practice law — of course you will decide that you won’t practice law — but clearly that does not stop the court proceedings from going,” he added.

The Deputy Attorney-General further dismissed the controversy surrounding the Chief Justice’s directive, accusing lawyers of using repeated objections and requests for adjournments to delay proceedings.

“As far as we are concerned, there is no controversy on this matter. It is just an attempt to, as usual, delay cases,” he said.

Justice Srem-Sai pointed to what he described as a recurring pattern in some of the cases affected by the directive.