Audio By Carbonatix
One of the Supreme Court judge designates has rubbished assertions he will return favours to the government whose leader nominated him to the highest court of the land.
Justice Yaw Apau said merely because he was nominated by President John Mahama does not mean he will rule in favour of the government on issues brought before him at the Supreme Court.
The nominee made the comments when he appeared before the Appointment Committee of Parliament, Tuesday to be vetted and hopefully sworn into his new role.
Justice Yaw Apau and the former General Secretary of the People's National Convention (PNC) Lawyer Gabriel Pwamang were nominated by president John Mahama to the Supreme Court.
The nominations were in line with Article 144(2) of the 1992 Constitution.
But the nominations have received some amount of criticisms. For Justice Yaw Apau critics said he was nominated to the position of the highest court as a reward for doing the president's bidding at the judgement debt commission.
Some even suspect he may rule in favour of government when the opportunity comes just so he will return a favour to the president for nominating him.
Others also sought to question the propriety in appointing a former General Secretary of a political party to that position.
But when he appeared before members of the Appointments Committee of Parliament, Justice Yaw Apau said he owed nobody any favours.
"Appoint your friend to the Supreme Court and he will become your enemy. The fact that you appoint him to the Supreme Court does not mean any new thing you want to introduce and that goes to the Supreme Court, that judge you appointed is going to side with you.
"We are judges. We look at the law," he assured.
He stated that his ascension to the Supreme Court has been on merit adding that he was appointed to the High Court and later to the Appeals Court under two different presidents- Rawlings and Kufuor respectively.
To submit to the whims of the appointing authority, Justice Apau noted will be to act unprofessionally.
"My duty is to apply the law as a judge without any strings. So if you are a judge and you attach political strings to your judgments then you are not performing your duties professionally as a judge," he said.
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