Disclose Ghana-US deportation agreement to Democracy Hub -Supreme Court orders AG

The Supreme Court has told the Attorney-General to produce the full agreement between Ghana and the United States on accepting deportees, so lawyers for the pressure group Democracy Hub can inspect it privately.

The court had earlier given both sides two weeks to file written arguments on why the document should or should not be disclosed. But the judges said the debate cannot be settled properly without seeing the actual text.

Deputy Attorney-General Justice Srem-Sai argued that the dispute is largely based on media reports, since the agreement has not been made public. The court said that point itself strengthens the case for access to the document.

The legal action followed comments by President John Mahama, who confirmed Ghana’s involvement in a US-backed plan to receive deported West African migrants. The disclosure triggered public debate and a court challenge.

At the centre of the case is whether the arrangement is simply a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), as government officials have described it, or a binding international deal that needs Parliamentary approval under Article 75 of the 1992 Constitution.