LAWS OF GHANA SIMPLIFIED

  I read with dismay a circular dated 13 th April, 2023, authored and circulated by the Ministry of Health to directorates, institutions and affiliate bodies under the Ministry. The Ministry’s directive is simply to remind these institutions that it has seen some Senior Staff in the Health Sector engaging in active partisan political activities. And that the Ministry is warning those Senior Staff to abreast themselves of the under listed guidelines and sanctions attached thereon, which guidelines and sanctions were culled from the Human Resource Management Policy and Manual for the Ghana Public Services particularly at pages 104 to 105: i.                    A Public Servant shall not openly participate in partisan political activities, seek political office whilst still in the public service or use Government facilities, equipment or resources to assist any candidate seeking elected politi...

The Osborns’s Concise Law Dictionary defines “arrest” as – “to deprive a person of his personal liberty by some lawful authority, for the purpose of compelling his appearance to answer a criminal charge or as a method of execution”. To put it in ordinary words, when you are arrested, it means you have been seized or held either by physical means or by being told verbally by another person usually a police officer. The reason for your arrest by the police is usually for you to be questioned and possibly sent to court to answer for a crime that you are suspected to have committed.   The Laws on arrest in Ghana are found in the 1992 Constitution, the Criminal Procedure Act, Act 30, 1960 and some other statutes and case law. This article is for the ordinary reader and so I do not intend to quote too much from these laws in order not to make it too legalese and difficult to read.   This write up will however attempt to shed light on some basics on ARREST to enlighten the ...