HER LADYSHIP JUSTICE SEDINAM AWO KWADAM (MRS.)*
12th NOVEMBER, 2025.
ABSTRACT
This paper presents a rigorous and multi-faceted critique of Order 73 of Ghana’s High Court (Civil Procedure) Rules, 2004 (C.I. 47) and Order 12 of the District Court (Civil Procedure) Rules, 2009 (C.I. 59), procedural relics that permit the pre-judgment arrest and detention of a civil defendant based on a plaintiff’s apprehension that they may frustrate the execution of a potential future judgment. The paper argues that this procedure constitutes a fundamental violation of the right to personal liberty under Article 14 of Ghana’s 1992 Constitution. It demonstrates that the rule is anachronistic, inconsistent with the Supreme Court’s progressive jurisprudence outlawing imprisonment for debt, and irreconcilable with Ghana’s obligations under international human rights law. By employing a layered analysis that incorporates doctrinal critique, historical contextualization, and a comparative examination of jurisprudence from other jurisdictions, this paper illuminates the global consensus against using coercive criminal measures for civil claims. The article concludes that the absconding warrant procedures under Orders 73 and 12 of Ghana’s civil procedure rules are a draconian power masquerading as a civil procedural tool and urgently calls for their expungement to align Ghana’s civil process with contemporary constitutional and human rights standards, advocating for their replacement with modern, asset-based interim remedies.
- INTRODUCTION: A CONSTITUTIONAL PARADOX IN CIVIL PROCEDURE
“Here stands a rule that cloaks coercion in the garments of civil process, that permits the hand of the law to seize a man not for what he has done, but for what another fears he might do. By a mere affidavit of belief, no trial, no verdict, the machinery of justice is turned against the very presumption it was built to defend. It is a grim paradox of our laws that this machinery is set in motion not by the solemn verdict of justice, but by the mere suspicion of one man. Thus, the defendant is cast not as a wrongdoer found guilty but as a soul ensnared in the cobwebs of conjecture, arrested and detained not for deeds done but for fears yet unborn. His liberty is weighed not in the scales of right, but in the coin of his purse.
Here stands the old spectre of the pretrial detainee cast into holding cells, not slain, but cunningly reborn, moved from the end of judgment to the dawn of dispute. It is upon this solemn altar of constitutional liberty that we now lay bare the enigma of Order 73 of the High Court (Civil Procedure) Rules, 2004 (C.I. 47) and Order 12 of the District Court (Civil Procedure) Rules, 2009 (C.I. 59). Thus, in a Republic born of freedom and justice, we witness the strange paradox of liberty in chains, and of civil justice borrowing the weapons of criminal law to soothe the apprehensions of private quarrels. It is the law devouring its own virtue; the Constitution betrayed by its own instruments; the triumph of suspicion over conviction, and the conquest of fear over freedom.” — Her Ladyship Justice Sedinam Awo Kwadam (Mrs.)
The entrenchment of Fundamental Human Rights and Freedoms in Chapter 5 of Ghana’s 1992 Constitution was a deliberate and profound repudiation of a past where such rights could be whimsically constricted. The seminal case of Re Akoto & 7 Others[1] stands as a stark jurisprudential memorial to that dark age, where fundamental rights were deemed unenforceable political rhetoric. The Constitution’s rigorous amendment process, requiring a national referendum for any alteration to its core rights provisions, underscores the supreme, almost sacrosanct, status of these rights in our legal order.[2] As Dotse JSC powerfully noted in Martin Kpebu (No.1), the import of this entrenchment is to avoid any relapse into those “dark, ignoble and shameful days.”[3] Central to this framework is the right to personal liberty under Article 14, a right so foundational that its deprivation is permitted only in exhaustively enumerated circumstances and strictly in accordance with procedure permitted by law.[4]
It is against this backdrop of constitutional solemnity that this paper subjects Order 73 and Order 12 to critical scrutiny. These rules, which allow for the issuance of an ‘absconding warrant’ to arrest and detain a defendant in a civil suit before judgment, represent a startling and paradoxical anomaly in our post-1992 legal architecture. It permits a plaintiff, on an ex parte application supported by an affidavit of belief, to set in motion a process that culminates in the defendant’s deprivation of liberty, not for any proven criminal offence, but on the mere apprehension, the spes futura, that a future judgment may be rendered nugatory.[5]
This paper contends, building upon earlier foundational critiques,[6] that Orders 73 and 12 are constitutionally infirm, jurisprudentially unsound, and an international outlier. It advances the thesis that the rules constitute a blatant and unjustifiable violation of the right to personal liberty under Article 14 of the 1992 Constitution, are fundamentally inconsistent with the Supreme Court’s own reasoning in outlawing the imprisonment of judgment debtors, creating a schism in our liberty jurisprudence, flouts the cardinal principle distinguishing civil from criminal procedure, effectively criminalizing a civil defendant, places Ghana in breach of its obligations under international human rights instruments, including the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, and is procedurally flawed and prone to egregious abuse, as evidenced by Ghanaian case law.
Through a layered analysis incorporating domestic precedent, historical context, comparative common law scholarship, and international human rights jurisprudence, this paper makes an unequivocal case for the immediate expungement of Orders 73 and 12 from our civil procedure rules, arguing that their continued existence is an affront to the spirit of the 1992 Constitution.
For the purposes of this paper, the analysis will engage with both Order 73 of the High Court (Civil Procedure) Rules, 2004 (C.I. 47) and Order 12 of the District Court (Civil Procedure) Rules, 2009 (C.I. 59). References to Order 73 shall, mutatis mutandis, extend to Order 12, as the latter constitutes a near replica of the former, embodying analogous procedural rules and principles within the District Court framework. This approach facilitates a coherent examination of the procedural regime across both judicial tiers.
- THE ANATOMY OF AN ANACHRONISM: DECONSTRUCTING ORDER 73
To fully grasp the gravity of the issue, one must dissect the mechanics of Order 73. The rule provides a multi-stage process for pre-judgment detention:
Firstly, the Ex Parte Application: A plaintiff may apply ex parte, meaning without notice to the defendant, supported by an affidavit stating a belief that the defendant is about to abscond from Ghana unless they are arrested.[7]
Secondly, the Warrant: If satisfied, the court may issue a warrant for the defendant’s arrest.[8] The prescribed form (Judicial Form 12) is stark, commanding the Registrar to take and arrest the body of the defendant.[9]
Thirdly, the Hearing and Bail: Upon arrest, the defendant is brought before the court and may be ordered to give bail or security for his appearance to answer any judgment that may be passed against him in the suit.[10]
And finally, Committal for Failure: If the defendant fails to provide the required bail or security, the court may commit them to detention in police cells until the suit is determined or until they provide the security.[11]
This process is triggered not by a finding of liability but by a subjective belief of the plaintiff. The defendant is thus placed in a Kafkaesque position: they are detained not for what they have done, but for what they might do in the future, and their liberty is made conditional on their ability to provide financial security for a debt whose existence is still contested. This is the very essence of a debtor’s prison, merely relocated to a point earlier in the timeline of litigation.
III. THE CONSTITUTIONAL SCHIZOPHRENIA: ORDER 73 VERSUS ARTICLE 14
Article 14(1) of the Constitution is a model of precision and intentionality. It does not merely guarantee liberty in a perfunctory manner; it meticulously catalogues the only exceptions, constructing a high and formidable wall against state (or state-sanctioned) interference. These exceptions, from the execution of a court sentence following a criminal conviction to reasonable suspicion of having committed a crime, or for educational or public health reasons, are uniformly predicated on a public law justification or the state’s parens patriae authority.[12] Conspicuous by its absence is any exception for securing the private financial interests of a litigant in a civil dispute. The Constitution simply does not countenance the use of the state’s coercive power to arrest and detain one citizen for the potential financial benefit of another.
Order 73 creates a parallel procedural universe where this constitutional wall is casually breached. A defendant can be arrested on a warrant, brought before the court, and ordered to provide a financial guarantee for their future availability. Failure to comply leads to committal to custody until security is given or the action is determined.[13] This process is initiated not by a finding of criminal guilt or even civil liability, but by a plaintiff’s ex parte allegation. The constitutional schizophrenia is starkly evident: the same legal system that, through its apex court, has condemned imprisonment for debt as an affront to a civilized society,[14] simultaneously maintains a procedural rule that sanctions pre-judgment detention for a debt that is merely speculative and unproven. This phenomenon in Ghanaian civil litigation and jurisprudence represents a profound dissonance under Ghana’s constitutional law.
- THE GHOST OF DEBTORS’ PRISONS: THE CONTROLLING PRECEDENT OF EX PARTE PPE LTDAND MARTIN KPEBU NO.1
The Supreme Court’s decision in Republic v High Court (Fast Track Division) Accra; Ex Parte PPE Ltd & Paul Juric[15] is a landmark of libertarian jurisprudence. The Court was faced with an attempt to commit a company Director to prison for failing to satisfy a judgment debt. Date-Bah JSC, in a powerful and resonant judgment, expressed profound disquiet, stating, “I very much doubt whether this is a restriction on personal liberty that is justifiable in a civilized democratic society.”[16] The Court authoritatively interpreted Order 43, r 12(1) of C.I. 47 as having removed the option of committal for the non-payment of a simple money judgment.
Atuguba JSC, concurring, noted that the deletion of this remedy was “in line with the fundamental principle of the liberty of the individual” enshrined in the Constitution.[17] This principle was later reaffirmed and solidified by a full bench of the Supreme Court in Martin Kpebu (No.1) v Attorney-General,[18] cementing the position that the liberty of an individual cannot be used as a bargaining chip or a coercive tool for the recovery of a private debt, even where the state is the beneficiary of that debt.
The logical and jurisprudential imperative of these decisions is inescapable.[19] If imprisoning a person after a court has authoritatively declared that they owe a debt is an affront to a civilized society, then arresting and detaining a person before any such determination is made is a constitutional travesty of a higher magnitude. Order 73 effectively punishes a defendant for a potential future failure, treating them as a prisoner of a lawsuit based on nothing more than a plaintiff’s fear and speculation. It resurrects, in a pre-trial context, the very spectre of debt imprisonment that the Supreme Court has so forcefully sought to exorcise from post-judgment execution.
- A WRONG IN SEARCH OF A REMEDY: THE MISAPPLICATION OF ARTICLE 14(1)(C) AND THE PROCEDURAL FLAWS OF ORDER 73
A potential, though fundamentally flawed, constitutional justification for Order 73 was tentatively suggested obiter in Republic v High Court, Koforidua; Ex Parte Augustus Osae.[20]
The Court, while critical of the procedure’s application, suggested that an absconding warrant could potentially fall under Article 14(1)(c), which permits deprivation of liberty “for the purpose of bringing him before a court in execution of an order of a court.”
With the utmost respect, this reasoning is circular and constitutionally unsupported.[21] The phrase ‘order of a court’ in Article 14(1)(c), if contextually and purposively interpreted, refers to a pre-existing, substantive order compelling an individual’s presence for a specific, legally recognized purpose, such as a subpoena, a witness summons, or a bench warrant issued in an ongoing criminal or contempt proceeding. Thus, it cannot be logically or legitimately stretched to mean the ex parte warrant itself, which is the very instrument of deprivation being challenged.
Such a construction creates a vicious circularity: the warrant is legal because it is an order of the court, and the order of the court is legal because the rule says so. This circularity empties Article 14 of its substantive content and ignores the constitutional requirement that the procedure itself must be permitted by a law that is consistent with the spirit and letter of the Constitution.[22] It reduces a fundamental right to a procedural formality.
Furthermore, the Supreme Court in Republic v High Court (General Jurisdiction) Accra Ex parte Darbo and Another[23] has explicitly condemned the procedural abuse inherent in Order 73 when applied without its mandatory safeguards. The Court, per Gbadegbe JSC, emphasized that the order for bail under Order 73 “arises only when, following his appearance before the court under a warrant issued under Order 73 rule (1) sub-rule (2), he is unable to show cause as provided for in rule 2 of the Order.”[24]
The Court held that the failure to afford the applicant the opportunity to show cause before ordering him to give bail was “procedurally flawed” and constituted “a clear denial of the applicant’s right to be heard before he was condemned to give bail,” rendering the order a nullity for having been made in excess of jurisdiction.[25]
This ruling underscores that even on its own terms, Order 73 is routinely misapplied in a manner that violates the audi alteram partem rule, reinforcing its inherently oppressive and procedurally precarious character.
- THE INTERNATIONAL CONSCIENCE: ORDER 73 IN THE LIGHT OF COMPARATIVE AND INTERNATIONAL JURISPRUDENCE
Ghana’s constitutional framework does not exist in a vacuum. The 1992 Constitution itself, in its Directive Principles of State Policy, encourages respect for international law and a readiness to accede to international human rights instruments.[26] An examination of international standards reveals how profoundly Order 73 deviates from established global norms.
- The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR)
Article 5 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), which protects the right to liberty, contains exceptions that closely mirror those in Ghana’s Article 14. The ECtHR has consistently held that detention to secure the fulfilment of a purely civil obligation is incompatible with Article 5.[27] In Guzzardi v Italy,[28] the Court emphasized that Article 5 is concerned with protecting individuals from arbitrary detention and requires a narrow interpretation of any exceptions to the right to liberty. While certain preventive detention measures with a direct nexus to criminal activity are permissible, detaining a person on the mere suspicion that they might not pay a potential civil judgment would undoubtedly be classified as arbitrary. The ECtHR’s jurisprudence insists on maintaining a clear distinction between criminal and civil matters to prevent the ‘blurring’ of the aims of the Convention.[29]
- The African Human Rights System
The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights has similarly affirmed the fundamental nature of the right to personal liberty. The Commission’s Principles and Guidelines on the Right to a Fair Trial and Legal Assistance in Africa explicitly state that “no one shall be deprived of his freedom except for reasons and conditions previously laid down by law,”[30]and that detention for the sole purpose of securing a civil debt is impermissible. The spirit of the African Charter, with its emphasis on human dignity, is fundamentally at odds with a procedure that allows for the incarceration of an individual based on a private party’s unproven fears.
- The United Kingdom: The Abolition of Mesne Process
The historical antecedent to Order 73 was the writ of capias ad respondendum in England, which allowed for the arrest of a defendant in a civil action before judgment. This practice was widely criticized as a tool of oppression and was progressively abolished, culminating in the Crown Proceedings Act 1947 and the Administration of Justice Act 1970, which swept away most of the remaining instances of imprisonment for debt.[31]
Modern English civil procedure provides a suite of sophisticated remedies, most notably the freezing injunction (Mareva injunction) developed by the Court of Appeal in Mareva Compania Naviera S.A. v. International Bulkcarriers S.A.[32] that achieve the legitimate aim of preserving assets from dissipation without resorting to the deprivation of the defendant’s liberty. The UK’s journey from arresting debtors to freezing assets charts a path of civil procedural evolution towards greater respect for human rights, a path that Ghana has yet to complete.
- The United States and Other Commonwealth Jurisdictions
The Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution prohibits ‘excessive bail’. While bail is a feature of the criminal process, the U.S. Supreme Court has historically frowned upon the use of ‘body execution’ for debt. Most states have constitutional provisions or statutes that explicitly prohibit imprisonment for debt. In Tate v. Short,[33]the U.S. Supreme Court held that imprisoning an indigent person for failure to pay fines violated the Equal Protection Clause, underscoring the principle that poverty should not lead to incarceration. This philosophy extends to pre-judgment detention in civil cases, which is virtually non-existent. The international consensus, reflected across common law jurisdictions from Canada to Australia and India, is that civil procedure must be sophisticated enough to protect a creditor’s legitimate interests without resorting to the barbarism of locking up a defendant who has been convicted of no crime. This global consensus stands in stark and damning contrast to the regime maintained under Order 73.
- ICCPR Article 11 as a Minimum Standard: The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), to which Ghana is a state party, sets a clear, non-derogable standard in Article 11: “No one shall be imprisoned merely on the ground of inability to fulfil a contractual obligation.” The operation of Order 73 constitutes a direct violation of this principle. The warrant is issued precisely on the apprehension that the defendant will be unable or unwilling to fulfil a potential future contractual or tortious obligation. By detaining a defendant to coerce them into providing security for a debt not yet proven, Ghana is imposing a “debtor’s prison” regime at the most vulnerable stage of litigation, before liability is even established. This is a more egregious violation than imprisoning a proven judgment debtor, which the Supreme Court has already condemned. This prohibition is not isolated. It is reinforced in other major regional human rights systems: The American Convention on Human Rights (Article 7(7)) provides an absolute prohibition: “No one shall be detained for debt,” with a narrowly defined exception only for alimony obligations. The Arab Charter on Human Rights (Article 18(7)) mirror the ICCPR’s language, creating a broad intercontinental norm.
VII. A CASE STUDY IN OPPRESSION: THE PRACTICAL APPLICATION OF ORDER 73
The theoretical and constitutional flaws of Order 73 are magnified by its practical application, as graphically illustrated in Ex Parte Augustus Osae.[34] In what the Supreme Court itself described as a “despicable story,” a plaintiff filed for an absconding warrant merely 40 minutes after issuing a writ in a straightforward civil dispute over the sale of vehicles. The High Court granted the application, and court officials attempted to arrest the defendant at his home as late as 10:00 pm on the same day, and again at 2:00 am the following morning.[35] The defendant was ultimately deprived of his liberty until he could meet stringent bail conditions.
While the Supreme Court condemned the “haste” and the “unholy hour” of the arrest attempt, the case reveals the inherent potential for abuse within Order 73 itself.
The rule, as noted in prior analysis, is executed by police and court bailiffs and, unlike standard court processes, has no temporal limits for its execution, meaning a defendant can be arrested at any hour, day, or night.[36]
The standard warrant form (Judicial Form No. 12) is a chilling document, commanding the Registrar to “take and arrest the body of” the defendant and deliver him to prison until he provides bail or security.[37] This language, evocative of a criminal warrant for a dangerous felon, is deployed in a purely civil matter. This creates a climate of intimidation and oppression, turning a civil dispute into a traumatic experience that leverages the state’s coercive power against an individual who, at that stage, is presumed to owe nothing and has committed no wrong.
The Court Registrars’ Handbook explicitly acknowledges the potential for abuse, noting that an absconding warrant is an order “to arrest a party in a suit who intends to move from his place of residing to an unknown place to avoid being served a court process or disobey a court order.”[38] However, it provides no objective guidance on the evidentiary threshold required to meet this standard, leaving it open to subjective and potentially malicious interpretation by plaintiffs.
The Handbook further instructs registrars that upon the grant of an ex parte application, they must “cause the absconding warrant to be issued immediately for the judge to sign upon payment of the fees” and “entrusts it to the chief bailiff for immediate action,”[39] creating a procedural conveyor belt that prioritizes speed over due process and reflective judicial consideration.
VIII. THE PATH TO REFORM: EXPUNGING AN ANACHRONISM AND EMBRACING MODERNITY
The continued existence of Order 73 is an indictment of our civil procedural architecture. The legitimate concern of a plaintiff that a defendant may dissipate assets to avoid satisfying a judgment is a real one, but it is amply and more appropriately addressed by other, more precise, and less rights-infringing tools within C.I. 47 itself and through the inherent jurisdiction of the court.
These modern interim remedies include Mareva Injunctions (Freezing Orders): A potent in personam order that restrains a defendant from dealing with or dissipating their assets worldwide, pending the outcome of litigation.[40] Orders for Preservation and Inspection: Under Order 25 rule 2(1), the court can make orders for the detention, custody, preservation, or inspection of any specific property which is the subject matter of the suit.[41] Anton Piller Orders: A search order that allows a plaintiff to enter the defendant’s premises to inspect and remove crucial evidence, thereby preventing its destruction.[42]
These remedies protect the integrity of the judicial process and the eventual execution of a judgment without sacrificing the fundamental liberty of the litigant. They target the assets, not the person.
Order 73 is not just unconstitutional; it is unnecessary in a modern procedural system. Its existence creates a mischief that can only be cured by its expungement.[43] In the same spirit, its mirror provision in the District Court rules, Order 12 of C.I. 59, must also be repealed to ensure consistency across the court system.
- CONCLUSION
Order 73 of C.I. 47 and Order 12 of C.I. 59 are a jurisprudential fossil, a relic from an era where the distinction between debtor and criminal was dangerously blurred and the liberty of the individual was subordinate to the interests of a creditor. Their operation, as laid bare in cases like Ex Parte Augustus Osae and Ex Parte Darbo, is a stark reminder of their oppressive potential and places Ghana at odds with its own constitutional values and its international human rights obligations.
This paper has demonstrated that the rule is untenable under Ghana’s 1992 Constitution, irreconcilable with the Supreme Court’s own progressive jurisprudence in Ex Parte PPE Ltd and Martin Kpebu No.1, procedurally flawed and prone to abuse, and an international aberration. It violates the essence of personal liberty and makes a mockery of the carefully constructed exceptions in Article 14 of the 1992 Constitution. It is a wolf in the sheep’s clothing of civil procedure, a draconian power that has no place in the legal system of a nation that professes to be a beacon of democracy and the rule of law in Africa.
This call for reform, the second I make, is not simply academic; it is both a constitutional duty and a moral imperative. The Rules of Court Committee must act with dispatch to introduce new Constitutional Instruments to expunge Order 73 from C.I. 47 and its counterpart, Order 12 from C.I. 59. In doing so, Ghana would take a decisive and long-overdue step toward a civil justice system that is not only efficient but also just, humane, and worthy of a civilized democratic society founded on the inviolable dignity of the human person.
The hour has come for the Bench, Bar, and Academia alike to awaken their collective conscience to this constitutional anomaly. Order 73 of C.I. 47 and Order 12 of C.I. 59 stand as a jurisprudential fossil, a relic of colonial subjugation masquerading as civil procedure. Their continued existence is not merely an oversight of legislative inertia; it is a quiet betrayal of the Constitution’s solemn promise that no person shall be deprived of liberty save in strict accordance with law and due process of justice.
Let it therefore be declared, in clarion tones that brook no dissent, that this legal anachronism, Orders 73 and 12, must be consigned to the jurisprudential ash-heap of history. They are a stain upon our statute books and a relic of a bygone age.
The Judiciary, acting through the Rules of Court Committee, must now heed this constitutional summons. To persist in the retention of a rule that permits the arrest and detention of a civil defendant without hearing and without the procedural safeguards guaranteed by our Constitution is to erode the very foundations upon which Ghana’s democratic order rests.
We have fought too long and too hard to erect the majestic edifice of our Constitution, a fortress for human dignity, only to permit a secret passageway within its walls through which the ancient spectre of the debtor’s prison may still creep. Will our courts be temples of reason, or will they remain, in this one dark corner, dungeons of fear? Will we champion the rights of the individual against the unproven fears of the powerful, or will we countenance a process where a citizen may be shackled on a whim, his liberty ransomed for a debt that may not even exist in the end?
The Supreme Court of Ghana has long affirmed the sanctity of personal liberty as the bedrock of constitutionalism. The spirit of our jurisprudence resounds with a singular truth, that constitutionalism is not a matter of administrative convenience, but of inviolable principle. Orders 73 and 12, by contrast, are an affront to that principle. They arrogate to creditors the coercive instruments of the criminal law, transforming civil debt into a gateway for detention, and thereby blurring the sacred boundary between justice and punishment.
The path forward is as clear as it is righteous. Let new Constitutional Instruments be drafted, laid, and passed with all deliberate speed, instruments that do not tinker or amend, but one that excises this cancerous growth with surgical precision. Let us expunge these rules, root and shoot, and in their place, let us reaffirm our unwavering commitment to the principle that in a nation of laws, no person shall be a prisoner of a civil lawsuit.
To expunge Orders 73 and 12 is to declare, once and for all, that in Ghana, liberty shall not be the privilege of the solvent, but the birthright of the human being. The gavel of justice must never again be mistaken for the jailer’s key. The world watches, history judges, and our own conscience demands nothing less.
* Justice of the High Court, Republic of Ghana; Adjunct Lecturer, International Criminal Law and Justice (ICL&J), Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA); LL.M.(Distinction) International Criminal Law and Justice (ICL&J) International Criminal Court (ICC) Elective, Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA) (2025); Valedictorian, 2025 Masters Cohort (GIMPA); Participant, ICC Summer School, Utrecht University (2025); Barrister-at-Law (BL), Ghana School of Law (2012); Best Student, Law of Evidence (2012 Call to the Bar); LLB, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST); Achimota School (2002).
The views expressed are personal and do not reflect the position of any institution.
[1] Re Akoto & 7 Others [1961] GLR 523.
[2] Constitution of the Republic of Ghana,1992, art 290(4).
[3] Martin Kpebu (No 1) v Attorney-General [2016] GHASC 8.
[4] Constitution of the Republic of Ghana,1992, art 14(1).
[5] High Court (Civil Procedure) Rules, 2004 (CI 47), O 73 r 1.
[6] See Sedinam Awo Kwadam & Emmanuel Babuboa, “THE PROPRIETY or OTHERWISE of ORDER 73 of CI 47 in LIGHT of EX PARTE PPE LTD & PAUL JURIC and MARTIN KPEBU (NO.1)”(The Law Platform: Legal Reflections 12th August 2024) https://thelawplatform.online/post/the-propriety-or-otherwise-of-order-73-in-light-of-ex-parte-ppe-ltd-and-martin-kpebu-no1 accessed 28th October 2025.
[7] CI 47, O 73 r 1.
[8] ibid.
[9] High Court (Civil Procedure) Rules, 2004 (C.I. 47), Judicial Form No. 12.
[10] CI 47, O 73 r 2.
[11] CI 47, O 73 r 4.
[12] Constitution of the Republic of Ghana,1992, art 14(1)(a)-(g).
[13] CI 47, O 73 r 4.
[14] Republic v High Court (Fast Track Division) Accra; Ex Parte PPE Ltd & Paul Juric [2007-2008] SCGLR 188, 191.
[15] Ibid.
[16] ibid.
[17] ibid.
[18] Martin Kpebu (No 1) v Attorney-General (n 3).
[19] Kwadam & Babuboa (n 6).
[20] Republic v High Court Koforidua; Ex Parte Augustus Osae [2009] SCGLR 573.
[21] Kwadam & Babuboa (n 6).
[22] See the dictum of Dotse JSC in *Martin Kpebu (No 1) v Attorney-General* (n 3) on the purpose of entrenchment.
[23] Republic Vrs High Court (General Jurisdiction) Accra Exparte Darbo and Another [2016] GHASC 56.
[24] ibid, at page 2 of the ruling.
[25] ibid, at page 4 of the ruling.
[26] Constitution of the Republic of Ghana,1992, art 40.
[27] See Aerts v Belgium (1998) 29 EHRR 50.
[28] Guzzardi v Italy (1980) 3 EHRR 333.
[29] ibid.
[30] Principles and Guidelines on the Right to a Fair Trial and Legal Assistance in Africa, Nº 4(m).
[31] See generally, Michael Zander, The Law-Making Process (6th edn, Hart Publishing 2004) 34-35.
[32] Mareva Compania Naviera S.A. v. International Bulkcarriers S.A. [1975] 2 Lloyd’s Rep 509.
[33] Tate v. Short, 401 U.S. 395 (1971).
[34] Ex Parte Augustus Osae (n 20).
[35] Kwadam & Babuboa (n 6), analyzing the factual narrative in Ex Parte Augustus Osae.
[36] Kwadam & Babuboa (n 8).
[37] High Court (Civil Procedure) Rules, 2004 (C.I. 47), Judicial Form No. 12.
[38] Court Registrars’ Handbook, The Judiciary of Ghana, at p. 25, para 3.J.vi.
[39] Court Registrars’ Handbook, The Judiciary of Ghana, at p. 29, para 3.P.c-d.
[40] See the principles in Third Chandris Shipping Corp v Unimarine SA [1979] QB 645.
[41] High Court (Civil Procedure) Rules, 2004 (CI 47), O 25 r 2(1).
[42] Anton Piller KG v Manufacturing Processes Ltd [1976] Ch 55.
[43] Kwadam & Babuboa (n 6).
