$10 Million Tears: Justice Gertrude Araba Esaaba Torkornoo’s demands not judicial reform. It is emotional capitalism.
$10 Million Tears: Justice Gertrude Araba Esaaba Torkornoo’s demands not judicial reform. It is emotional capitalism.
Ghana’s suspended Chief Justice, Her Ladyship Justice Gertrude Araba Esaaba Torkornoo, has taken her robe and her broken pride to the ECOWAS Court in Abuja, seeking ten million US dollars in compensation. You heard right. Not GHS. Dollars. One, zero, comma, zero, zero, zero, comma, zero, zero, zero.
Apparently, her soul has been bruised so severely by her suspension that only a dollarized balm from the ECOWAS Court can soothe it.
This is nothing close to normal. Ghana has had coups, curfews, calamities, and even cloned cats pretending to be prophets. But never have we seen a sitting or suspended Chief Justice file a continental lawsuit for moral injury. This isn’t judicial reform. It is emotional capitalism.
And the irony? She is arguing before a foreign bench that the Ghanaian system she once sat atop is no longer fit to process her pain. The same Ghanaian system she chaired, defended, and presided over, even as ordinary citizens wailed under judicial delays, suspicious rulings, and vanishing dockets.
You see, when ordinary citizens claim injustice in Ghana, they are often told, “Go to court.” But when Justice Torkornoo claims injustice, she skips Ghana’s courts because she suddenly doubts that “the law is the law” and heads straight to the ECOWAS Court in Abuja. First class, presumably, with diplomatic immunity and prayer shawls in tow.
If hypocrisy were grounds for impeachment, we would have no need for petitions.
Simplifying the issue. Her Ladyship was suspended under Article 146 of the Constitution. A process she herself has likely interpreted from the bench during her rise. Yet suddenly, the same Constitution is “unclear” when it affects her. Suddenly, the same CHRAJ she empowered is biased. Suddenly, procedural fairness is no longer theoretical but a personal blood sport.
And what exactly is the damage? Reputational loss. Madam, respectfully, your reputation was already wobbling long before the ink dried on your suspension letter. Whether it was the unexplained U-turns in politically sensitive rulings, your silence during judiciary procurement scandals, or the mystery of vanishing precedents under your leadership, the trust deficit didn’t begin on April 22nd. It was a slow judicial suicide, punctuated by pageantry.
And now, after abandoning Ghana’s legal forums, she demands ten million dollars from the Republic. Essentially, from the same taxpayers she once advised to “trust the system.” What’s next? A GoFundMe campaign for bruised egos? A bailiff to serve God for not intervening?
No doubt about it. This isn’t a legal case. It’s a drama. A grand act in the theatre of elite fragility, where power sees itself as victim when accountability comes knocking.
And while she prepares exhibits for ECOWAS, some of us are still waiting for justice in the Techiman 8 killings, the Ayawaso West Wuogon by-election violence, the unresolved SALL disenfranchisement, the fake chieftaincy proliferation cases, the MIIF scandal, the Cecilia Dapaah cash stash mystery, the judicial silence over the GHS 456,000 renovation contract awarded to her daughters under restrictive tendering, the growing list of politically motivated prosecutions, and the many others gathering dust on Ghana’s docket of selective justice. Yet none of these have triggered moral lawsuits or million-dollar sob stories.
Justice, they say, must not only be done but must be seen to be done. But in this case, what we are seeing is not justice. It is a well-rehearsed show. A performance dressed in legal robes and emotional speeches. And the sad part? Ghana might still be the one paying for the show.
So cry me a river, My Lady. Cry all the way to Abuja. But remember, if justice is truly blind, it should not come with a price tag for tears. Especially not ten million dollars per drop.
