President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has nominated Gertrude Araba Esabaa Torkornoo, a Justice of the Supreme Court, as the next Chief Justice of Ghana.

When approved by Parliament, Justice Torkornoo will replace Justice Kwasi Anin Yeboah, who retires as Chief Justice on May 24, this year, when he reaches the mandatory retirement age of 70 for justices of the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court.

In a letter addressed to the Chairperson of the Council of State, Nana Otuo Siriboe II, President Akufo-Addo stated that Justice Torkornoo who has been “on the Supreme Court for the last four (4) and has been a member of the Judiciary for the last nineteen (19) years is duly qualified and eminently” fit to discharge the functions of Chief Justice.

“In order to avoid a vacuum and ensure that a new Chief Justice is immediately in office after his retirement, I have decided to begin the process of appointment now.”
President Akufo-Addo

Justice Torkornoo, when approved, will become the third female Chief Justice in history, following the footsteps of Justices Georgina Theodora Wood and Sophia Akuffo. Also, she will be President Akufo-Addo’s third appointment to the office of Chief Justice since he assumed office in January 2017.

Profile of Justice Gertrude Torkornoo

Gertrude Araba Esaaba Torkornoo (born 11 September 1962) is a Ghanaian judge and was nominated to the Supreme Court in November 2019 and received parliamentary approval in December 2019, and was sworn in on 17 December 2019.

She has been on the bench in Ghana since 2004 and was appointed a Supreme Court judge in 2019. Justice Torkornoo was one of the first Justices of the Commercial Division of the High Court and has been active in the core reform agenda and activities of the Judiciary and Judicial Service of Ghana since 2005.

Justice Torkonoo is an alumna of the University of Ghana and graduated from the Ghana School of Law in 1986.

In 2001, she obtained a Postgraduate Diploma in International Law and Organization from the International Institute of Social Studies (ISS), part of Erasmus University in the Netherlands and in 2011, she graduated from Golden Gate University, USA with an LLM in Intellectual Property Law.

Prior to joining Fugar & Co., a law firm in Accra as an associate, Justice Torkornoo worked as a volunteer at the FIDA Legal Aid Service and did an internship with Nabarro Nathanson in London. She returned to the firm (Fugar & Co.) in 1994 to become a director.

In January 1997, she co-founded Sozo Law Consult where she worked as Managing Partner until 14 May 2004 when she was appointed a Justice of the High Court of Ghana. She worked as a High Court judge until October 2012 when she was elevated to the Court of Appeal.

Justice Torkornoo has held several leadership roles in the judicial service. In her work as chair of E-Justice Committee, she has led the planning of automation of all levels of courts, procurement and incorporation of the use of electronic resources and software in the work of the Judicial Service.

She has also served as the Supervising Judge of commercial courts since 2013 where she has set the agenda for and chaired the meetings and programs of the Users Committee of the Commercial Courts.

Justice Torkornoo presided over the implementation of the Business Environment Engineering Project (BEEP) funded by the Department for International Development (DFID) of the United Kingdom.

Her leadership directions in that project ignited and provided the Ministry of Trade and Industry with guidance on the introduction of Users Committees into other institutions that participated in the BEEP project. The BEEP project further influenced the active development of the Business Environment Reforms being streamlined into national institutions by the MOTI.