Over 59,000 court cases pending in Ghana courts

Ghana's justice of the court of appeal has revealed that over 59 000 cases are pending at various courts across the west African country.

According to Joy News, Justice Samuel Marful-Sau encouraged the judges to work harder in clearing the backlog.

At least 20 judges were sacked last year after they were implicated in what was termed the country's biggest judiciary scandals.

The dismissals came after hearings before a five-member disciplinary committee appointed by Ghana's chief justice Georgina Wood focusing on undercover footage shot by a local newspaper.

Justice Marful-Sau urged the judges to be "proactive" in applying CI 87, which he claimed would help in clearing up the cases.

The CI 87 is an amendment of the High Court Procedure of CI 47 2004 which regulates civil proceedings in the High and Circuits courts.

Marful-Sau said although the introduction of CI 87 was to speed up court cases, a number of lawyers and judges were yet to understand how the new system worked, adding that they were  still holding on to the older traditional system.

Source: News 24