Frimpong Boateng and Another v New Patriotic Party and Others (J1/5/2026) [2026] GHASC 61 (29 July 2026)

IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF JUDICATURE IN THE SUPREME COURT ACCRA - A.D. 2026

Coram

BAFFOE-BONNIE CJ (PRESIDING) PWAMANG JSC AMADU JSC ASIEDU JSC GAEWU JSC DZAMEFE JSC SUURBAAREH JSC

WRIT NO. J1/5/2026

29TH JULY, 2026

1. PROF. KWABENA FRIMPONG BOATENG ………….. 1ST PLAINTIFF

2. DR. NYAHO NYAHO-TAMAKLOE ………….. 2ND PLAINTIFF

3. DR. CHRISTINE AMOAKO-NUAMAH ………….. 3RD PLAINTIFF

VRS

1. NEW PATRIOTIC PARTY …………… 1ST DEFENDANT

2. NATIONAL DEMOCRATIC CONGRESS …………… 2ND DEFENDANT

3. CONVENTION PEOPLE'S PARTY ……………. 3RD DEFENDANT

4. ELECTORAL COMMISSION OF GHANA ……………. 4TH DEFENDANT

5. THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL …………… 5TH DEFENDANT

Majority Opinion

BAFFOE-BONNIE CJ:

PLAINTIFFS’ CASE

1. By writ dated 26th January 2026, the Plaintiffs invoked the original jurisdiction of this Court seeking the following reliefs against the Defendants: i. A declaration that upon a true and proper interpretation of the Preamble and Articles 1(1) and (2), 17, 33(5), 35(6)(d), 42 and 55(5) of the 1992 Constitution the election of a political party’s presidential and parliamentary candidate(s) constitutes a cor e element of the party’s internal organisation within the meaning of Article 55(5) of the Constitution.

ii. A declaration that upon a true and proper interpretation of the Preamble and Articles 1(1) and (2), 17, 33(5), 35(6)(d), 42 and 55(5) of the 1992 Constitution, the internal organisation of a political party must be structured in a manner that ensures equal political participation and equal voting rights of its members in the selection of the party’s presidential and parliamentary candidate(s).

iii. A declaration that, on a true and proper interpretation of the Preamble and Articles 1, 17, 33(5), 35(6)(d), 42, 55(2), 55(5), 63 and 93 of the 1992 Constitution, democratic principles governing the internal organisation of political parties require political equality, meaningful and broad participation of members in decision -making, accountability of leadership to the membership, and substantially equal and direct

voting rights for members in good standing in the election of the party’s presidential and parliamentary candidates.

iv. A declaration that the delegate -based Electoral College system established under Article 13 of the Constitution of the 1 st Defendant for the election of its presidential candidate, which confines or restricts voting to specified executives, office holders and delegates to the exclusion or material disenfranchisement of members in good standing of the party, contravenes the Pr eamble and Articles 1, 17, 33(5), 35(6)(d), 42 and 55(5) of the 1992 Constitution and is therefore unconstitutional, null, void and of no effect.

v. A declaration that the Extraordinary Constituency Delegates Conference system established under Article 7 of the Constitution of the 1st Defendant for the selection or election of its parliamentary candidates, which confines voting to specified constituency executives, coordinators, polling station officers, elders, patrons and other delegates to the exclusion or material disenfranchisement of members in good standing of the party, contravenes the Preamble and Articles 1, 17, 33(5), 35(6)(d), 42 and 55(5) of the 1992 Constitution and is therefore unconstitutional, null, void and of no effect.

vi. A declaration that the Electoral College system established under Articles 43 and 44 of the Constitution of the 2 nd Defendant for the election of its presidential and parliamentary candidates, which confines or restricts voting to specified executives, office holders and delegates to the exclusion or material disenfranchisement of members in good standing of the party, contravenes the Preamble and Articles 1, 33(5), 17, 35(6)(d), 42 and 55(5) of the 1992 Constitution and is therefore unconstitutional, null, void and of no effect.

vii. A declaration that the Constituency Branch Party Conference system and the National Delegates Congress system established under Articles 53, 96 and 77 of the Constitution of the 3rd Defendant for the election of its presidential and parliamentary candidate (s), which confines voting to specified executives, elders, officers and delegates to the exclusion or material disenfranchisement of members in good standing of the party, contravenes the Preamble and Articles 1, 17, 33(5), 35(6)(d), 42 and 55(5) of the 1992 Constitution and is therefore unconstitutional, null, void and of no effect.

viii. A consequential order striking down and declaring unconstitutional, null, void and of no effect all provisions of the constitutions, rules, regulations or electoral arrangements of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Defendants, to the extent that they restrict or confine the election of their presidential and parliamentary candidates to limited Electoral Colleges, delegate bodies or similar structures, or otherwise exclude or materially disenfranchise members in good standing of the parties from voting in elections for their presidential candidates.

ix. An order directing the 1 st, 2 nd and 3 rd Defendants to amend their respective constitutions, rules and electoral arrangements to adopt procedures for the election of their presidential candidates or flagbearers that conform to the democratic principles required under Article 55(5) of the 1992 Constitution and ensure the equal, direct and meaningful participation of members in good standing in such elections.

x. An order directed at the 4th Defendant, in the exercise of its supervisory and regulatory mandate under the Constitution and Act 574, to ensure and enforce the 1st,

2nd, and 3 rd Defendant’s compliance with the Preamble and Article 55(5) of the Constitution and Section 9(a) of Act 574 in respect of their internal elections.

xi. Such further or consequential orders as this Honourable Court may deem just.

2. The 1992 Constitution places a sacred duty upon every political party to ensure that its internal organization is democratic. It provides in Article 55(5) that “[t]he internal organization of a political party shall conform to democratic principles and its actions and purposes shall not contravene or be inconsistent with this Constitution or any other law. ” The Plaintiffs are of the view that the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Defendants have failed to do this.

3. The basis of the Plaintiffs’ contention is that the constitutions of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Defendants currently employ delegate -based systems for selecting their presidential and parliamentary candidates. And although the Defendants differ in the compositio n of their respective electoral bodies and in certain procedural details, the Plaintiffs contend that they all share one common characteristic: the final decision on who becomes each party's presidential or parliamentary candidate is made by a limited class of delega tes as opposed to the general membership of the party.

4. With respect to the 1st Defendant, the Plaintiffs state that Article 13 of its Constitution governs the nomination and election of the party's presidential candidate. While any eligible member may seek nomination, the final election is conducted through a body of delegates and not by the universal participation of all members. The delegates comprise specified categories of party officials and functionaries, including the party's national, regional, constituency and polling station executives, past national officers, Members of Parliament, members of the Council of Elders, founding members, patrons, recognised representatives of party organs, and other designated persons. According to the Plaintiffs, only these

delegates are entitled to vote, with the result that ordinary members who do not hold any designated office or delegate position, play no direct role in choosing the party's presidential candidate.

5. The Plaintiffs further state that the 1st Defendant adopts a similar approach in selecting parliamentary candidates. Under Article 7 of its Constitution, parliamentary candidates are elected at a Constituency Delegates Conference attended only by specified delegates, including constituency executives, electoral area coordinators, polling station executives, representatives of the Constituency Council of Elders, patrons and founding members. Ordinary party members who fall outside these categories are excluded from voting.

6. Regarding the 2nd Defendant, the Plaintiffs explain that its constitutional arrangements have evolved over time. When the party's Constitution was first adopted in 1992, both presidential and parliamentary candidates were selected through delegate -based el ectoral colleges comprising national, regional and constituency executives, office holders, Members of Parliament, Ministers, members of the Council of Elders, founding members, representatives of affiliated organizations and other designated delegates. Vo ting rights were therefore confined to a limited body of party functionaries. The Plaintiffs state that this position changed in 2015 when the 2nd Defendant amended its Constitution to introduce universal suffrage for presidential primaries. Under the amended Article 44, every member registered in the party's biometric register became entitled to vote directly in the election of the party's presidential candidate. The amendment therefore replaced the delegate -based system with direct participation by the wider membership.

7. However, the party subsequently amended its constitution in 2019, through which the party abandoned universal suffrage and restored the delegate-based Electoral College. As matters presently stand, the Plaintiffs contend that the party has returned to a sy stem in which

presidential candidates are chosen by a restricted body of delegates rather than by all members. They further state that under Article 41 of the 2nd Defendant’s Constitution, the selection of parliamentary candidates likewise remains the responsibility of a delegate-based Electoral College composed of designated party officials and representatives.

8. With respect to the 3rd Defendant, the Plaintiffs state that its Constitution also adopts a delegate-based approach to selecting candidates for public office. Under Article 96, the party's presidential candidate is elected by the National Delegates Congres s following a vetting process. The National Delegates Congress is the party's highest decision -making body and is composed of specified categories of party officials and representatives, including members of the National Executive Council, the Council of E lders, founding members, constituency officers and representatives from tertiary institutions and overseas branches. Only these delegates are entitled to vote in the presidential primary, while ordinary party members who do not hold any designated office or delegate position are excluded.

9. The Plaintiffs further state that the 3rd Defendant employs an equally restricted process for selecting parliamentary candidates. Under Article 53 of its Constitution, parliamentary candidates are elected by the Constituency Branch Party Conference, whose membership is limited to constituency executives and other designated representatives. The party's Central Committee retains an oversight role in approving the selected candidate. As with the presidential primary, ordinary members of the party do not vote directly in the selection of parliamentary candidates.

10. The plaintiffs contend that the delegates system is fundamentally inconsistent with democratic principles because it excludes the overwhelming majority of party members from directly participating in the selection of presidential and parliamentary candidat es. In their submission, democracy within a political party necessarily demands equal voting rights for

every member, arguing that universal adult suffrage is sacrosanct in our constitutional dispensation.

DEFENDANTS’ CASE 1st Defendant

11. The 1st Defendant submits that its internal electoral arrangements fully comply with the democratic principles required by Article 55(5) of the Constitution. It argues that democratic principles should not be narrowly equated with universal suffrage or a s ystem in which every member of a political party votes directly in every internal election. In its view, democratic principles encompass broader values such as the rule of law, accountability, free and fair elections, transparency, representation and parti cipation, all of which, it contends, are reflected in its Constitution.

12. According to the 1st Defendant, the Plaintiffs' case is founded on the mistaken assumption that Article 55(5) constitutionally mandates direct democracy within political parties. It argues that democracy exists in different forms and that representative de mocracy is as legitimate a democratic model as direct democracy. It argues that representative democracy permits members to elect representatives who, in turn, make decisions on their behalf. It contends that this is the same model adopted by Ghana's const itutional system, where citizens elect Members of Parliament to legislate on their behalf, and that such a system has never been regarded as either undemocratic or unconstitutional.

13. The 1st Defendant explains that its internal organisational structure is itself representative and democratic. All members in good standing are entitled to participate in polling station elections, where they elect their polling station executives. Those executives subsequently elect representatives at successive levels of the party's hierarchy, culminating in the Electoral College responsible for electing the party's presidential and parliamentary candidates. It

therefore submits that every delegate ultimately derives his or her mandate from the party membership and that no member of the Electoral College assumes office by imposition or appointment outside this representative process.

14. The 1st Defendant further argues that article 55(5) must be interpreted purposively, in accordance with the well -established jurisprudence of this Court. It submits that constitutional provisions must be construed in light of their text, context, spirit an d underlying values rather than through a narrow or literal approach. Read within the broader framework of Chapter 7 of the Constitution, the Defendant contends that article 55(5) was intended to guarantee democratic governance within political parties while preserving their autonomy to determine how members participate in internal decision -making. It maintains that the Constitution deliberately refrains from prescribing any single model of internal democracy, thereby leaving political parties free to adopt structures suited to their own organisational needs, provided those structures remain democratic.

15. The 1st Defendant also contends that the interpretation advanced by the Plaintiffs would effectively compel every political party in Ghana to adopt direct democracy, thereby denying political parties the constitutional freedom to organise themselves in accordance with their own constitutions. It argues that such an approach would undermine the associational autonomy of political parties and would amount to the Court imposing one particular model of democracy in circumstances where Article 55(5) recognises a broader range of democratic arrangements.

16. The 1 st Defendant finally argues that the delegate system is itself an accepted form of representative democracy, promotes broad participation through elected representatives, preserves accountability to the membership, and therefore fully satisfies the constitut ional

requirement that the internal organisation of political parties conforms to democratic principles. It concludes that the Plaintiffs' claims should therefore be dismissed.

2nd Defendant

17. The 2nd Defendant substantially agrees with the Plaintiffs' challenge and concedes that its existing delegate -based system for electing presidential and parliamentary candidates is inconsistent with the democratic principles required by Article 55(5) of th e Constitution. It submits that universal adult suffrage and equal voting are indispensable features of Ghana's constitutional democracy and are essential to preserving the sovereign will of the people. In its view, a political party that restricts voting in its presidential and parliamentary primaries to a limited class of delegates undermines these constitutional values and acts contrary to both the letter and spirit of Article 55(5). It therefore agrees with the Plaintiffs that all members of the party i n good standing should be entitled to participate directly in the election of the party's presidential and parliamentary candidates.

18. Accordingly, it contends that Articles 43 and 44 of its Constitution, which establish the delegate-based electoral college for presidential and parliamentary primaries, are inconsistent with Article 55(5) of the Constitution, and asks this Court to so declare.