QUALITY
LEGAL EDUCATION V MASS PRODUCTION OF LAWYERS
‘Two are better than one, [b]ecause they have good
reward for their labor’
– Ecclesiastes
4:9(NKJV)
There is a subtle yet fierce battle raging
mainly in Ghana’s legal fraternity. It is a battle of access to legal education
and its expansion. One school of thought advocates for overhauling of Ghana’s legal
education through decentralisation, standardisation, transparency and fairness
to enhance access. The other school of thought insists on restricting access to
legal education citing quality over quantity. In the opinion of the latter school
of thought, guarding against mass production of lawyers is a measure to curb
indiscipline and mediocrity in the legal profession.
The quality school of thought appears to
suggest that quality resides in few and that mass production of anything affects
its qualitative function. The quantity school of thought however believes
access to educational opportunities and facilities is a constitutionally
guaranteed right which ought to be respected and promoted.
Are quality and quantity mutually
exclusive? Is quantity a life-time enemy of quality? Whose duty is to ensure
quality legal education in Ghana? Is not multiplication God’s idea? Does not God
expect everything He has created to continuously multiply itself? Why should we
insist, for example, on only producing five quality lawyers only if we can have
twenty such? Is it the case that we honestly do not have what it takes to
produce many quality lawyers? Truly, quality and quantity are not mutually
exclusive. Ten quality lawyers are better than just two.
The main issue we should thus focus on is
how Ghana can produce more quality lawyers in the wake of increase demand for
its legal education? The production of Toyota automobiles started in the 1930s.
Toyota Motor Corporation produced its first passenger car (Toyota AA) in 1936. The
company has been producing more than ten million vehicles each year since 2012.
Although mass production of vehicles may be different from mass production of
lawyers, the key lesson to draw is that mass production of quality is cogent
evidence of progress and relevance. Perhaps, but for mass production of quality
vehicles today, the level of efficiency we are experiencing in commerce and
indeed nearly all aspects of human life would not have been achieved. King Solomon,
the wisest king in history, is right in saying that “two are better one...” Certainly,
two quality lawyers are better than one.
Richard
Obeng Mensah, author
of Persecutions are Promotions
The writer is a blogger,
legal academic, life and leadership coach,
and a private legal
practitioner in Ghana.
Blog:
www.richard-obeng-mensah.blogspot.com Email: richardobengmensah@gmail.com
Facebook:
https://web.facebook.com/obeng.m.richard?_rdc=1&_rdr
© 28 October 2019.
