Macbeth in Parliament: A Timely Warning for Ghana’s Judiciary.

When the Minority Leader, Hon. Alexander Afenyo-Markin, began his remarks during the vetting of Justice Paul Kwadwo Baffoe-Bonnie with a quotation from William Shakespeare’s Macbeth, Act I, Scene 7, he transported Parliament from the floor of debate to the realm of moral reflection. It was more than rhetoric—it was a courageous invocation of conscience.

In Macbeth, Shakespeare writes, “If it were done when ’tis done, then ’twere well it were done quickly.” The Scottish Thane wrestles with ambition, guilt, and the irreversibility of moral decay once power is pursued at any cost. In our own context, that soliloquy stands as a mirror to the uneasy state of Ghana’s judiciary, where the pursuit of control has eclipsed the pursuit of justice.

Over the past ten months, the Attorney General’s office has, with increasing audacity, weaponized the judiciary. Political prosecutions, selective interpretations of law, and procedural manipulations have eroded public confidence in what should be the last refuge of fairness. The nomination and vetting of Justice Baffoe-Bonnie as Chief Justice are therefore not mere constitutional exercises; they are moral tests for a nation’s soul.

Hon. Afenyo-Markin’s literary reflection was not about drama; it was about duty. It was a plea for introspection, a reminder that the judiciary, stripped of balance, ceases to be an arbiter of justice and becomes a tool of political vendetta.

As a proud patriot, I could not resist tipping my hat to the Minority Leader. His intervention must be remembered, not as a partisan gesture, but as a patriotic act of courage. May the parliamentary Hansard preserve this moment for posterity, for within that reflection lies the timeless truth that “the evil men do lives after them.”

Let the judiciary take heed. Power, when untempered by conscience, is but a poisoned chalice from which nations drink their own decay.

In his own words, Justice Paul Kwadwo Baffoe-Bonnie once remarked: “In my youthful days, I gave somebody 70 years… I gave him 70 years, Atta Ayi. … What I told myself was that if Atta Ayi was given 30 years and he comes back, my family will be the first he will attack. So by the time he comes back after 70 years, I will be dead and gone.”

That statement: though humanly candid; is profoundly troubling when uttered by a nominee for Chief Justice. It frames justice not as impartial reasoning but as personal calculation. When sentencing is guided by private fear rather than objective principle, law ceases to be blind and becomes self-protective. This is not jurisprudence; it is survival instinct.

A Chief Justice must interpret the Constitution with equanimity, fidelity to law, and distance from personal or political motive. Yet this statement suggests a mindset inclined toward self-preservation rather than moral courage. It raises the question: How might such a judge interpret the Constitution when the political winds blow against justice?

This is why the Minority Leader’s invocation of Macbeth was prophetic. Macbeth’s torment over ambition mirrors the moral peril before us: a judiciary tempted to serve power rather than restrain it. When ambition eclipses integrity, when personal interest overrides public duty, the justice system becomes the very poisoned chalice Macbeth feared.

For ten months, the Attorney General has turned the courts into political instruments; prosecuting opponents while insulating allies. In this climate, the judiciary’s independence depends not merely on law but on leadership. The next Chief Justice will either defend judicial integrity or deepen institutional decay.

Hon. Afenyo-Markin’s reflection must therefore stand as a national admonition: that Ghana’s judiciary must not become a refuge for ambition nor a tool of retribution. The law must remain our final sanctuary, not the final theatre of political revenge.

Let the Hansard preserve his words forever. For as Shakespeare reminds us, “The evil men do lives after them.”

Powered by Froala Editor