We should normalize judges having political inclinations - Kofi Bentil

Kofi Bentil says judges having political inclinations not a crime

In the US political parties of judges are known – IMANI vice president

Sosu’s comments on political judges not wrong – Dr Bentil


Senior Vice President of IMANI Africa, Dr Kofi Bentil, has urged Ghanaians to understand that judges also have political parties they support.

According to Dr Bentil, even though judges had political inclinations, these inclinations do not affect their judgments.

“We should be normalizing the fact that judges have political leanings. I don’t know why we keep making that such a difficult issue. And we should be normalizing the thought that regardless of a judge’s political leaning, his or her judgments are based on the law, facts and evidence,” he said on Joy News’ Newsfile monitored by GhanaWeb.

“I’m telling you that almost every judge that I know, makes decisions based on the law and evidence and the facts regardless of their politics. So, this whole thing about a judge has a political leaning, it is politicians who appoint judges and no sensible politician will appoint a judge who is not of his fraternity,” he added.

The IMANI vice president further stated that judges even role cases against their friends and then supporting certain political parties or making private comments in favour of some parties should not be a crime.

He added that in the United State the political affiliation of judges is known to everyone and presidents mostly appoint judges who support their party’s ideology.

Touching on the “political judges” statement made by Madina MP Francis-Xavier Sosu, Dr Bentil said even though he thinks the member of parliament should have been more careful and comments he made are not wrong.

“But what did Sosu say? He said if you make yourself a political judge, then you’ll be judged as such. There is no problem with that. And the irony is that I spoke to one judge who said they don’t see where the problem is, and they the judges have a problem with their colleagues who are political judges because they taint all of them,” she said.

During the ‘Yentua Demo’, the Madina MP, Francis-Xavier Sosu, issued a stern warning to judges of the various law courts in the country against doing the bidding of the ruling government.


He said judges whose actions and inactions are deemed to be politically motivated would be dealt with if the National Democratic Congress (NDC) comes to power.