Supreme Court Justice nominee Barbara Frances Ackah-Yensu has shocked some members of the appointments committee including the chairman Joseph Osei-Owusu with her advocacy for applying Alternative Dispute Resolution, (ADR) in environmental crimes including galamsey.
She opined that the current ADR laws must be amended to that effect.
“Speaking as a Judicial officer, we will determine if any case comes before us on the harmful nature of galamsey, we’ll look at the particular circumstances of each case and apply the law and make a determination. But as a propenent of ADR, I think that a section of environmental matters in the ADR Act, probably will have to be looked at again so that we can try applying ADR mechanisms in resolving galamsey.”
The Supreme Court nominee made the suggestion when answering questions from minority leader Haruna Iddrisu on the galamsey menace during her vetting Tuesday.
When asked the role ADR will play specifically in dealing with galamsey cases, the nominee said:”ADR will come between the communities and the perpetrators if they are made to sit together and have a conversation.”
Her answer drew in chairman of the committee Joseph Osei-Owusu who questioned whether the nominee has ever been to a galamsey site before to appreciate the level of devastation, but the Justice nominee answered, No!
On the dwindling confidence in the judiciary by the public, Barbara Frances Ackah-Yensu though conceded some level of confidence has been lost argued majority of the public still has trust in the judicial system thus the increasing number of cases judges have had to deal with every day.