It will be unlawful, unjust to compel us to admit 499 candidates: They failed entrance exams-GLC to court

The General Legal Council is praying the High Court (Human Rights Division) not to compel it to admit the 499 candidates into the Ghana School of Law.

According to the GLC, such an order will be unlawful, unjust, inconvenient, unfair, and inequitable since the said candidates failed the entrance examination.

“That I am advised by Lawyer for the 1st Respondent and verily believe same to be true that it will be unlawful, unjust, inconvenient, unfair and inequitable for this Honourable Court to compel the 1st Respondent to offer admission to the Applicants into the Ghana School of Law for the 2021/2022 academic year when they failed to pass the 2021 entrance examination,” it noted.

This is contained in its response to an APPLICATION BY DANIEL SACKEY AND 142 FOR THE ENFORCEMENT OF THEIR FUNDAMENTAL HUMAN RIGHTS.

143 applicants of the Ghana School of Law have sued the General Legal Council and Attorney General, seeking an interlocutory injunction against the respondents.

According to the applicants,  they sat the August 24, 2021 entrance Exams of the Ghana School of Law and passed yet were unjustifiably denied admission by the General Legal Council.

The suit which was deposed to by one Daniel Sackey, an applicant of the GSL, is seeking the court’s intervention to curb irreparable damage that will be done to them if the 2021/2022 academic year of the Ghana School of Law is started without them.

Furthermore, they note that while pursuing their LLB, they heard about the 50% pass mark into the Ghana School of Law.

That this 50% pass mark has over the years been communicated publicly to Ghanaians and the same was done in 2019 by the then Chief Justice, Sophia Akuffo.

They also state that before the entrance exams in May this year, the Acting Director of the Ghana School of Law, Mr.Maxwell Opoku Agyemang reiterated the 50% pass mark policy.

Moreover, an advertisement to this effect was published on May 14, 2021, in the Daily Graphic as part of an invitation for applications from qualified LLB graduates for admission into the Ghana School of Law.

In summary, they indicate that the admission procedure involved them passing the written examination conducted by the 1st respondent per the requirement they had heard years ago.

However, the applicants lament that contrary to the above they sat the exams and obtained marks ranging from 50 to 61 but the General Legal Council has refused to offer them admission based on the illegal explanation that even though they attained the minimum threshold if their marks were broken down, they will not obtain at least one-half(50%) of the marks in each section of the examination; A being a total of 40 marks and Section B being a total of 60 marks. Thus they did not obtain at least 20 marks in section A and 30 marks in section B.

In its response, however, the General Legal Council has denied each and every allegation of fact contained in the affidavit in support of their application for interlocutory injunction.

Furthermore, it faulted the applicants on their allegation of having passed the 2021 entrance examination insisting that they failed since none of their index numbers as provided in their application was on its pass list published in September 2021.

Additionally, it noted that the procedure involving applicants passing a written examination conducted by its outfit, is not the only requirement for admission into the Ghana School of Law and that it is vested with the statutory discretion to determine the number of students to be admitted to the PLC each academic year.

Moreover, it stated that the GLC(1st Respondent) is further vested with the statutory discretion to disqualify a person from admission for any justifiable reason.

On the issue of threshold mark for eligible applicants to be offered admission, the GLC reiterated the fact that it is the body responsible for setting same pursuant to law and denied also the claim that it has espoused a policy which set the “minimum threshold as 50 marks”.

It intimated therefore that only candidates or applicants who obtained the minimum threshold mark of 50% each in the two sections for A and B(Part A and Part B) of the exam were eligible to be considered for admission by its outfit for the 2021/2022 academic year to pursue the PLC.

Also, the GLC denied communicating a minimum threshold mark for the 2021 entrance examination prior to candidates sitting for the examination thus applicants understanding that the minimum threshold is 50 marks and knowledge that upon attaining any mark 50 or higher…became entitled to be admitted into the Professional Law Course as manifested by the generally accepted pass mark-50” is highly misconceived and not grounded in law or procedure.

The first Respondent(GLC) moreover stated in its reply that there is no irreparable damage that would occasion the Applicants should the court refuse the instant application.

In conclusion, the GLC prayed the court to dismiss the instant application.

“That in the circumstances, I pray that this Honourable Court dismisses the instant application and award costs against the Applicants,” it ended.

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