When the stool is defiled: Enstoolment, gazettement, and the rule of law in Ghana’s chieftaincy institution

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Ghana’s chieftaincy institution is one of the most enduring pillars of our national identity — a living heritage that links our communities to ancestors, land, and governance. Yet across the country today, this sacred institution is under assault from an insidious threat: the manipulation of chieftaincy processes for political gain, personal ambition, and family intrigue.

This article addresses two profoundly consequential scenarios that are increasingly common in our traditional areas: first, the chief who is legitimately enstooled by customary law but has never been formally gazetted; and second, the individual who bypasses the sacred customary processes entirely, and without any gazette recognition, forcefully occupies the royal palace through political connections, family manipulation, and the exercise of raw power. 

Both scenarios create legal chaos, community strife, and lasting damage to the institution of chieftaincy.

The case of the Eastern Nzema Traditional Council is no longer merely a chieftaincy dispute — it has crossed into the gravest of criminal territory. The sitting gazetted Paramount Chief, Awulae Amihere Kpanyinli III, was forced to evacuate the Royal Palace following an assassination attempt orchestrated against him by his own senior sister — a matter that was reported to and taken up by the Regional Police Command, whose investigations are ongoing but have been stalled by political machinations. Separately, ten suspects were arrested by the District Police Command in connection with the illegal installation and unlawful breach of customary law, and have since been granted bail. While the Royal Palace stands as an active crime scene under police jurisdiction, the very senior sister who instigated the assassination attempt covertly arranged for her youngest son — a candidate who does not qualify as successor to the throne under the applicable customary law — to be hastily and unlawfully installed and to forcefully occupy the Royal Palace. This ungazetted, customarily invalid occupant now holds a royal palace that is simultaneously a crime scene, backed by politically exposed persons close to the presidency. 

This article uses that deeply alarming crisis, alongside the governing law, to educate the public, the chieftaincy institution, and all stakeholders on where Ghana stands legally when these abuses occur.

PART ONE: THE LEGAL ARCHITECTURE OF CHIEFTAINCY IN GHANA

Before analysing the complications that arise from defective enstoolment and gazettement, it is essential to understand the legal foundation upon which Ghana’s chieftaincy institution stands.

1.1 The Constitutional Guarantee

Chapter 22 of the 1992 Constitution of Ghana, specifically Articles 270 to 277, provides an entrenched constitutional guarantee for the chieftaincy institution. Article 270(1) declares that the institution of chieftaincy, together with its traditional councils as established by customary law and usage, is hereby guaranteed. The Constitution goes further to restrain Parliament itself from passing any law that confers on any person or authority the right to accord or withdraw recognition to or from a chief, or that in any way detracts from the honour and dignity of the institution.
This constitutional guarantee means that chieftaincy legitimacy flows from customary law — not from the State, not from political patronage, and not from family convenience.

1.2 The Statutory Framework: Chieftaincy Act, 2008 (Act 759)

The primary legislation governing chieftaincy is the Chieftaincy Act, 2008 (Act 759), which operationalises the constitutional provisions. This Act establishes the National House of Chiefs, the Regional Houses of Chiefs, Traditional Councils, and Divisional Councils. It sets out procedures for enstoolment, destoolment, registration, and gazettement. Critically, it creates criminal offences for misconduct in connection with chieftaincy.

1.3 Who Is a Chief Under the Law?

Article 277 of the 1992 Constitution and Section 57(1) of the Chieftaincy Act, 2008 define a chief in terms that are both precise and uncompromising: “A chief is a person who, hailing from the appropriate family and lineage, has been validly nominated, elected or selected and enstooled, enskinned or installed as a chief or queenmother in accordance with the relevant customary law and usage.”

This definition contains three critical and conjunctive requirements that must ALL be met simultaneously:

•The person must hail from the appropriate family and lineage — customary eligibility cannot be manufactured or bypassed.

•The person must have been validly nominated, elected or selected — the process by which a candidate emerges must itself be valid.

•The person must have been validly enstooled, enskinned or installed in accordance with the relevant customary law and usage — the installation ceremony and all associated rites must be properly performed.

All three must coexist. A person from the right family who is installed in a defective ceremony is not a chief. A person from the wrong family who is installed in a perfect ceremony is not a chief. Customary law is not a menu from which one selects convenient items.

1.4 The Hierarchy of Gazettement

A widespread misunderstanding in the public domain concerns who gazettes whom. The hierarchy is as follows:

•Paramount Chiefs are gazetted by the Regional House of Chiefs, following review and entry into the National Register of Chiefs maintained by the National House of Chiefs.

•Divisional Chiefs are gazetted by the Paramount Chief of their traditional area.

•Sub-chiefs and lower-ranked chiefs are gazetted by the appropriate Divisional Chief or Traditional Council.

Section 57(5) of the Chieftaincy Act is unambiguous on the statutory significance of gazettement: a person shall not be considered to be a chief for the performance of any function under this Act or any other enactment unless that person has been registered in the National Register of Chiefs and that person’s name has been published in the Chieftaincy Bulletin.

The gazette notification is, in essence, the bridge between customary legitimacy and statutory recognition. Without it, a chief exists in customary law but is invisible to the State.

PART TWO: THE CHIEF WHO IS ENSTOOLED BUT NOT GAZETTED

This scenario is more common than many realise, and its legal consequences are serious and far-reaching.

2.1 Customary Standing vs. Statutory Capacity

The law draws a sharp distinction between customary standing and statutory capacity. A chief who has been validly enstooled in accordance with customary law has undeniable legitimacy within his community and under customary law. His subjects recognise him. His ancestors sanction his occupation of the stool. The kingmakers who installed him stand behind him. But without gazettement, he is legally handicapped in his dealings with the State and with third parties.

2.2 The Six Critical Disabilities of the Ungazetted Chief

i. Cannot Perform Statutory Functions

The ungazetted chief cannot sit on the Traditional Council in any statutory capacity, cannot vote in chieftaincy elections, and cannot represent his stool in the Regional or National Houses of Chiefs. All his decisions and resolutions in those institutional settings are without statutory standing and can be invalidated on that ground.

ii. Stool Lands Authority is Exposed and Vulnerable

Ghana’s Constitution vests all stool lands in the appropriate stool on behalf of, and in trust for, the subjects of the stool in accordance with customary law and usage. However, a chief’s authority to execute leases, grant concessions, sign deeds, or authorise extraction from stool lands requires that he be identifiable in the National Register. Where he is not, his transactions over stool land are legally precarious. Lessees and concessionaires dealing with an ungazetted chief operate at their own risk, as those transactions can be challenged and voided.

iii. Compromised Right to Sue and Be Sued in His Chiefly Capacity

The general principle in Ghanaian law is that only the occupant of the stool or the head of family can sue or be sued in respect of stool or family property. An ungazetted chief’s legal standing to litigate on behalf of the stool is open to challenge by any adverse party. This can paralyse efforts to protect stool lands from encroachment, illegal farming, mining, or development.

iv. Exclusion from Government Benefits and Programmes

Chiefs receive meagre quarterly stipends, sitting allowances, and other government-channelled benefits through the Houses of Chiefs. Ungazetted chiefs are entirely off the official register for these benefits. They are also excluded from formal government consultations on development, infrastructure, and resource management affecting their traditional areas.

v. Vulnerability to Being Superseded

Perhaps most dangerously, the absence of gazette notification creates a legal vacuum that bad-faith actors can exploit. A rival claimant — or worse, a family member with political backing — can move swiftly to install an alternative candidate and push through a gazette entry. Once that entry exists, however flawed its foundation, it carries the appearance of official State recognition. Dislodging it requires costly, time-consuming proceedings before the Judicial Committee of the Regional House of Chiefs.

vi. Inability to Convene or Preside Over Traditional Council Proceedings

Section 62 of the Chieftaincy Act provides that enstoolment must be reported to the National House of Chiefs, and only registered chiefs can preside over and participate in formal Traditional Council proceedings. An ungazetted chief who attempts to convene such proceedings creates a legal cloud over every decision taken at those meetings.

2.3 The Practical Lesson

A legitimate enstoolment without gazettement is like a deed without registration — the right exists in principle, but it cannot be fully enforced, and it is exposed to attack. Every chief and every stool should treat gazettement as an urgent administrative duty, not an optional formality.

PART THREE: THE GAZETTED CHIEF WITHOUT VALID CUSTOMARY ENSTOOLMENT

This is the more dangerous scenario — and the one at the devastating heart of the Eastern Nzema Traditional Council crisis. It involves an individual who, without any gazette recognition and without undergoing the sacred customary process that the law requires, has covertly been installed and has forcefully occupied the Royal Palace — a palace that at the material time constitutes an active crime scene — through political influence, family manipulation, and the wrongful exercise of raw power. That this occupation was engineered by the same person whose assassination plot against the legitimate Paramount Chief triggered the vacancy of the palace makes it not merely a chieftaincy matter, but a criminal outrage of the highest order.

3.1 The Gazette Does Not Create a Chief

This point bears repeating with the utmost clarity: the gazette notification does not confer chieftaincy. It records chieftaincy. A gazette entry that records a defective or fraudulent enstoolment is not a record of truth — it is a record of a lie. And the law has mechanisms to expose and correct that lie.

3.2 The Critical Role of Valid Nomination

The Supreme Court of Ghana, in the landmark case of In re Wenchi Stool Affairs: Sramangyedua v. Nketia [2011] 2 SCGLR 1024, established one of the most important principles in chieftaincy law: nomination is the foundation upon which all subsequent processes rest. If there is no valid nomination, or if the nomination is so flawed or faulty as to be void, there is no basis for performing any of the other processes — election, selection, enstoolment, or installation. They all collapse.

The court further held that customary law provides well-settled procedures to follow in making nominations, and that these procedures must be strictly observed. Where kingmakers are bypassed, where the wrong family nominates, or where the nomination process is driven by family intrigue rather than customary protocol, the entire chieftaincy edifice built on that defective nomination is null and void from the beginning.

3.3 The 14-Day Public Notice Requirement

Section 62(2) of the Chieftaincy Act, 2008 contains a sweeping provision that is often overlooked. Despite any provision of the Act, an installation of a chief or queenmother is not valid unless, at least fourteen days before the date of the installation, public notice of it — in accordance with the custom of the area — has been given. The purpose of this provision is precisely to prevent hasty, secret, and politically-rushed installations that deny the broader community any opportunity to raise objections before an irreversible ceremony is conducted.
A “chief” installed in violation of this 14-day notice requirement is not legally installed at all — regardless of any subsequent gazette entry.

3.4 The Seven Legal Consequences of Political Gazettement Without Customary Validity

i. The Gazette Entry Can Be Challenged and Nullified

The Judicial Committee of the Regional House of Chiefs has original jurisdiction in all matters relating to a paramount stool or skin. Any aggrieved person — including members of the royal family, the legitimate kingmakers, or the broader community — can petition the Judicial Committee to investigate the customary validity of the enstoolment. If found to be defective, the gazette entry will be ordered to be expunged from the National Register of Chiefs.

ii. Transactions Over Stool Lands Are Voidable

Any leases, concessions, or land grants executed by a fraudulently gazetted chief can be voided in court. This creates a catastrophic risk for any investor, mining company, or developer who transacts with such an individual, since the purported chief has no legal title to convey. The financial losses can be enormous, and the legal battles protracted.

iii. Criminal Liability for Fraud and False Declaration

The Chieftaincy Act creates specific criminal offences in connection with chieftaincy. Any person who makes false declarations on the Chieftaincy Declaration Form submitted to the Houses of Chiefs — or who procures a gazette entry through misrepresentation of the customary process — exposes themselves to criminal prosecution. Those who assist, whether kingmakers who falsely certify an enstoolment, politically exposed persons who use their influence to push through an entry, or officials who process a manifestly irregular declaration — all bear potential criminal liability. In the Eastern Nzema situation, the criminal exposure extends far beyond chieftaincy offences and operates on two distinct tracks. First, the orchestration of an assassination attempt against a sitting gazetted Paramount Chief engages the most serious provisions of Ghana’s criminal law, including conspiracy to murder and abetment of crime — a matter before the Regional Police Command whose investigation has been unconscionably stalled by political machinations. Second, the illegal installation and unlawful breach of customary law has already resulted in ten arrests by the District Police Command, with the suspects granted bail and investigations continuing. Every person in the chain of both conspiracies — from the instigator to the political facilitators to those who physically effected the installation and occupation — bears criminal accountability proportionate to their participation. The stalling of the assassination investigation by political interference is not merely an obstruction of justice; it is itself a criminal act that the Attorney-General and the Office of the Special Prosecutor are duty-bound to address.

iv. Forcible Occupation of the Royal Palace is a Criminal Offence

This point is of direct and urgent relevance to the Eastern Nzema situation. A person who enters and occupies a Royal Palace without lawful title is committing trespass and, depending on the means of entry and occupation, may be committing criminal offences including unlawful entry, forcible possession, and conduct likely to cause a breach of the peace. The fact that the occupant claims chieftaincy does not suspend the ordinary law of the land. The Ghana Police Service has both the jurisdiction and the legal duty to act where a Royal Palace is seized by force, particularly where lives and property are at risk.

v. No Protection from Legitimate Destoolment

A chief without genuine customary foundation is acutely vulnerable to a proper destoolment. The kingmakers whose procedures were bypassed have both the customary right and the legal standing to bring destoolment charges before the Traditional Council or Regional House of Chiefs. The gazette entry provides no protection from a valid customary destoolment process conducted according to law.

vi. Decisions and Appointments Are Without Legal Effect

Any decisions made by a fraudulently gazetted “chief” — including any gazettement of sub-chiefs or divisional chiefs under him — are legally tainted by the foundational invalidity. If the paramount chieftaincy is void, the derivative appointments flowing from it are equally void. This has a cascading effect on the entire hierarchy of a traditional area.

vii. Political Sponsors Bear Moral and Legal Accountability

Politically exposed persons who use their proximity to power to facilitate the installation or gazettement of unqualified chiefs are not immune from accountability. Where their conduct amounts to abuse of office, corruption, or obstruction of justice, they expose themselves to legal consequences under the ordinary laws of Ghana and potentially under the Office of the Special Prosecutor’s mandate regarding corruption-related offences.

PART FOUR: THE EASTERN NZEMA CRISIS — A CASE STUDY IN INSTITUTIONAL ABUSE

The ongoing crisis in the Eastern Nzema Traditional Council illustrates, with painful and shocking clarity, the collision between legitimate customary authority, murderous family intrigue, and political opportunism. What began as a chieftaincy dispute has escalated into a criminal matter of the gravest order. Without pronouncing on the final merits of any specific claim — which are properly before the relevant Judicial Committees and law enforcement authorities — the following factual elements, as reported and publicly known, raise profound legal, constitutional, and criminal concerns that demand the urgent attention of every institution of the Ghanaian State.

4.1 The Assassination Attempt: When Family Betrayal Turns Criminal

The facts as they are known place the Eastern Nzema crisis in a category far beyond ordinary chieftaincy disputes. Two separate and distinct criminal matters are simultaneously in play, handled by two separate arms of the Ghana Police Service. First, the assassination attempt: Awulae Amihere Kpanyinli III, the sitting gazetted Paramount Chief of the Eastern Nzema Traditional Area, was the target of a premeditated assassination attempt orchestrated by his own senior sister. This matter was taken up by the Regional Police Command, whose investigations remain ongoing — but have, by credible account, been stalled by political machinations, a state of affairs that is itself a matter of profound public concern. The Paramount Chief was evacuated from his Royal Palace for his own safety — a forced displacement from his own ancestral seat, brought about not by any lawful destoolment or voluntary abdication, but by the threat of murder. Second, and separately, the illegal installation and unlawful breach of customary law: ten suspects connected to the forcible and irregular installation of the unqualified candidate were arrested by the District Police Command and have since been granted bail, with that matter also under investigation. The instigator behind both criminal threads is the Paramount Chief’s own senior sister — the very person who, having engineered his forced departure from the palace, covertly arranged the installation of her youngest unqualified son to occupy it. In the annals of Ghana’s chieftaincy history, it would be difficult to find a more egregious case of premeditated criminality being deployed as the instrument of a succession conspiracy. The Royal Palace of Awulae Amihere Kpanyinli III is therefore an active crime scene, and must be treated as such by every institution of the State.

A gazetted Paramount Chief does not cease to be the lawful occupant of his stool because some family members declare it so, or because an assassination attempt forces him to seek safety. The law does not recognise kitchen-table destoolments. It does not recognise destoolments by attempted murder. It does not recognise destoolments by palace seizure. Awulae Amihere Kpanyinli III remains, in law, the occupant of the Eastern Nzema paramount stool. The stool is not vacant. His forced evacuation under threat of death does not constitute abdication, and creates no lawful basis whatsoever for a rival enstoolment.

4.3 The Hastily Installed Candidate

The purported installation of a candidate championed by the senior sister of Awulae Amihere Kpanyinli III — her own youngest son, who does not qualify as a successor to the throne under the applicable customary law and line of succession — raises immediate legal questions on multiple fronts. What makes this situation not merely egregious but criminally extraordinary is the following established sequence of events: the senior sister orchestrated an assassination attempt against her own brother, the sitting gazetted Paramount Chief — a matter now under Regional Police Command investigation, stalled by political machinations; Awulae Amihere Kpanyinli III was consequently evacuated from the Royal Palace for his own safety; the senior sister then covertly arranged for her youngest unqualified son to be hastily and illegally installed and to occupy that palace by force, in flagrant breach of customary law — an act for which ten suspects were separately arrested by the District Police Command and subsequently granted bail, with investigations continuing. Two police commands. Two criminal dockets. One architect. This is not a succession dispute. This is a calculated criminal enterprise, dressed in the garments of a chieftaincy claim. The legal questions that must be answered are therefore not merely customary but fundamentally criminal in nature: Was there a lawful vacancy on the stool? No — for the sitting chief was neither dead, destooled, nor abdicated. Was the 14-day advance public notice given? Was the installation customarily valid? And critically — how does any purported enstoolment conducted in the shadow of an active assassination investigation, on the premises of a crime scene, attract any legitimacy whatsoever under the law?

In the absence of satisfactory answers to each of these questions, the purported enstoolment carries no legal weight whatsoever. It is a legal nullity, regardless of how many dignitaries attended the ceremony or how loud the celebration was.

4.4 The Ungazetted Occupation of the Royal Palace — A Crime Scene

The legal dimension of the palace occupation in the Eastern Nzema case is extraordinary and demands unambiguous statement. The Royal Palace of Awulae Amihere Kpanyinli III is, at the material time of this article, an active crime scene — the scene of a premeditated assassination attempt against a sitting gazetted Paramount Chief, whose investigation by the Regional Police Command has been stalled by political machinations. It is also the site of an illegal installation and flagrant breach of customary law, in connection with which the District Police Command separately arrested ten suspects, who have since been granted bail. Under the laws of Ghana, an active crime scene is under the jurisdiction and protective custody of law enforcement. No person — regardless of what chieftaincy title they claim — has the legal right to enter, occupy, or conduct any activity within an active crime scene without the express sanction of the investigating authority. The covert entry and forcible occupation of the Royal Palace under these circumstances is not merely trespass; it is interference with a crime scene, obstruction of a criminal investigation, and a contempt of the police authority conducting that investigation. That this occupation was facilitated by politically exposed persons — and that the assassination investigation itself has been politically stalled — compounds the gravity to a level that demands the intervention of the highest prosecutorial authorities in the land. A person who has not been gazetted — who is not recorded in the National Register of Chiefs as the occupant of the stool — has no legal right to occupy the Royal Palace under any circumstances. That that palace is simultaneously a crime scene removes every conceivable justification for the occupation and elevates it to a matter of the most urgent criminal law enforcement.

The acquiescence of State institutions in the face of such conduct — particularly where an active criminal investigation is underway — does not legitimise it. It emboldens further violations, and it makes those institutions complicit in the subversion of both the chieftaincy institution and the criminal justice system.

4.5 The Role of Political Sponsorship

Ghana’s Constitution is explicit: Parliament cannot pass a law conferring on any person or authority the right to accord or withdraw recognition from a chief. By extension, no President, Minister, Member of Parliament, or party official has the authority to install, recognise, or confer legitimacy on a chief. In the Eastern Nzema situation, the involvement of politically exposed persons close to the presidency in facilitating or condoning the occupation of a Royal Palace that is an active crime scene — by an ungazetted, customarily invalid occupant whose installation was engineered by the very individual whose agents attempted to assassinate the sitting Paramount Chief — is constitutionally impermissible, criminally reckless, and an affront to the rule of law. That the Regional Police Command’s investigation into the assassination attempt has been stalled by political machinations is a direct indictment of those who have chosen personal and political loyalty over their constitutional obligations. Where political influence has been exercised to suppress the rightful occupant of a stool, to shield perpetrators of a criminal conspiracy from accountability, and to obstruct a lawful police investigation into an attempted murder, it does not merely constitute an assault on the chieftaincy institution. It constitutes an assault on the constitutional order of the Republic of Ghana itself. The Office of the Special Prosecutor, the Attorney-General, and all relevant law enforcement authorities have both the mandate and the obligation to follow this matter wherever the evidence leads — regardless of who it implicates.

PART FIVE: WHAT THE LAW REQUIRES — PATHWAYS TO RESOLUTION

For those genuinely committed to the rule of law and the integrity of the chieftaincy institution, the pathways to resolution are clear.

5.1 For the Aggrieved Legitimate Chief and His Supporters

•File a petition before the Judicial Committee of the relevant Regional House of Chiefs challenging the purported destoolment and the unlawful installation of the new candidate.

•Simultaneously pursue injunctive relief through the High Court to restrain the unlawful occupants of the Royal Palace pending the resolution of the chieftaincy dispute.

•Report the forcible occupation of the Royal Palace to the Ghana Police Service, specifically referencing unlawful entry, trespass, and conduct likely to cause a breach of the peace.

•Engage the Chieftaincy Secretariat of the Ministry of Chieftaincy and Religious Affairs to ensure that no gazette entry is made in respect of any unrecognised claimant while the dispute remains unresolved.

•Engage civil society, the media, and community stakeholders to ensure transparency and public awareness of the true legal position.

5.2 For the Regional House of Chiefs

•Exercise original jurisdiction promptly and decisively over any matter affecting the paramount stool.

•Refuse to submit any Chieftaincy Declaration Form to the National House of Chiefs in respect of a claimant whose enstoolment is demonstrably defective or is the subject of active litigation.

•Investigate and discipline any officials who may have processed or are processing irregular documents.

5.3 For the National House of Chiefs

•Exercise the review function under Section 50 of the Chieftaincy Act diligently, ensuring that no name is entered into the National Register of Chiefs without adequate scrutiny of the Chieftaincy Declaration Form and the customary process it purports to record.

•Issue a public statement clarifying the legal position on the obligations of all parties in contested paramountcies.

5.4 For the General Public and Community Members

•Understand that chieftaincy legitimacy flows from customary law, not from political power. A ‘chief’ installed by politicians is not a chief — he is an impostor.

•Do not transact in stool lands with any person whose chieftaincy status is disputed or whose gazette status is unclear.

•Report intimidation, threats, and illegal occupation of traditional palaces to the appropriate law enforcement authorities.

•Support legitimate chieftaincy structures and resist the temptation to acquiesce in political manipulation of the institution for short-term personal gains.

CONCLUSION: THE STOOL IS SACRED — THE LAW IS THE GUARDIAN

Ghana’s chieftaincy institution has endured for centuries because it is rooted in something deeper than politics: it is rooted in the covenant between the living, the dead, and the yet unborn. The stool is not merely a seat of authority — it is the embodiment of the soul of the people. When we allow it to be seized by family intrigue, political manipulation, and brute force, we do not merely harm one chief or one community. We inflict a wound on the entire nation.

The law, as set out in the 1992 Constitution and the Chieftaincy Act, 2008, is the guardian of this institution. It provides clear standards for who is a chief, how they become a chief, and what happens when the process is corrupted. Those standards exist for good reason: they protect the community, preserve the ancestral heritage of the stool, and ensure that chieftaincy remains a force for development, peace, and governance rather than a prize to be captured by the politically powerful.

The situation in the Eastern Nzema Traditional Council is a test of whether those standards mean anything in practice. The legal framework is clear. The customary norms are established. What remains is the willingness of the institutions — the Regional House of Chiefs, the National House of Chiefs, the courts, law enforcement, and ultimately the State — to enforce them without fear or favour.

To the people of the Eastern Nzema Traditional Area and to all Ghanaians who care about the integrity of our traditional institutions: the stool belongs to the people, held in trust by the rightful occupant. It cannot be claimed by force. It cannot be bought by political patronage. It cannot be stolen by family ambition. The law says so. History says so. The ancestors say so.

A chief who is enstooled without customary validity and who occupies a Royal Palace without gazette recognition is not a chief — he is a pretender. A pretender who seizes a palace by force is not a ruler — he is a trespasser. And a pretender who occupies a palace that is an active crime scene, engineered there by the architect of an assassination plot against the lawful occupant, is not merely a trespasser — he is a participant in a criminal enterprise. The rule of law, properly enforced, recognises no other conclusion.

About the author

Nana Annor Amihere II is the Overlord of the Aiyinasi-Basake Enu Kpanyinli Abusua Stool Lands in the Ellembelle District, Western Region of Ghana, and the Immediate Past President of the Ghana Institute of Safety and Environmental Professionals (GhISEP, 2016–2022). He is a Road Safety Advocate, member of the NRSA Technical Working Group on Vehicle Conversion Standards, and a prominent voice in Ghana’s development discourse. He is a descendant of Joseph Crosby Annan, the Gold Coast botanist who established the first cocoa experimental farm in the Western Province at Aiyinasi.