2008
SUPREME COURT
GHANA
CORAM
AI Generated Summary
The Supreme Court of Ghana, per Sophia Akuffo JSC delivering the ruling of the court, set out reasons for overruling the Accra Metropolitan Assembly’s preliminary objection to a public‑interest constitutional action brought by a Ghanaian citizen against AMA and the Attorney‑General. The plaintiff sought declarations that AMA’s practice of engaging workers to carry human excreta in pans on their heads is degrading, cruel, and unconstitutional under article 15(1)-(2), plus an order to abolish the practice. AMA challenged the plaintiff’s locus standi and the Supreme Court’s original jurisdiction, arguing that enforcement of fundamental rights belongs exclusively to the High Court under article 33(1). The Court distinguished articles 2(1) and 33(1), reaffirming Sam (No 2) and the CIBA case: article 33(1) governs personal rights enforcement “in relation to” the plaintiff in the High Court, while article 2(1) is a special Supreme Court jurisdiction enabling citizens—natural or artificial—to enforce or interpret the Constitution in the public interest. Applying these principles, the Court held the plaintiff was not enforcing his own rights, but seeking constitutional enforcement in the public interest, so the case was properly before the Supreme Court; the preliminary objection was overruled, and the matter adjourned.
SOPHIA AKUFFO JSC delivered ruling of the court, giving the reasons for the court's decision overruling the preliminary objection by the first defendant to the plaintiffs action.
By a writ filed on 23 December 2005, the plaintiff in his capacity as a Ghanaian citizen, commenced an action, invoking the original jurisdiction of this court against the first defendant, Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA), and the second defendant, the Attorney-General, for the following reliefs:
"(1) A declaration that:
'(a) the act or practice of the first defendant in making and/or causing some citizens of Ghana to carry human excreta ... in pans on their heads is an affront to the dignity of such persons in particular and Ghanaians as a whole;
(b) the act ... is cruel, inhuman and degrading and also detracts from the dignity and worth of such people in particular and Ghanaians as a whole;
(c) the practice or act is inconsistent with and in contravention of article 15(1) and (2) of the 1992 Constitution....
(2) An order directing the defendants to cause the immediate abolition of the practice..."
In his statement of case in support of the writ, the plaintiff contended that the persons who are engaged by the first defendant to undertake the work of carrying human excreta are compelled to do so by poverty and that, although he had, on numerous occasions, sought to draw the government's attention to the degrading, unhealthy and unconstitutional nature of the practice, the first defendant "has been the worst offender" and continues to engage personnel to carry such human waste in various parts of Accra. The first defendant is the body actually engaging people for the inhuman practice, whilst the second defendant, the Hon Attorney-General, is the representative of the State.
Both first and second defendants filed statements opposing the plaintiffs claims. The first defendant, however, inter alia, also questioned the plaintiffs locus standi in this matter as well as the power of this court to receive and consider the plaintiffs writ under its original jurisdiction, on the basis of the provisions of articles 33(1) and 130(1) of the 1992 Constitution. Consequently, the court ordered all parties to file legal submissions, focusing, particularly, on the issue of whether or not the matter was properly before the court, in terms of both the plaintiffs locus standi and the court's jurisdiction. Subsequently the court ruled t