File your submissions – Court orders parties in Rasta students case

The Accra High Court has ordered the parties in the case involving admission denial of a Rastafarian student to file their legal arguments.

The legal team for one of the Rastafarian students Tyron Marhguy, and Achimota School, are to file their arguments by Wednesday, April 28, 2021.

The court’s decision comes after the lawyer for the applicant, James Gawuga Nkrumah, explained to the court that “they have responded to the court’s earlier directive dated April 13, and have duly served on the other respondents”.

But the court presided over by Gifty Agyei Addo said it has only received that of the school and not the Board of Governors for Achimota School.

Chief State Attorney Stella Badu explained to the court that the Board of Governors was a different legal entity from the school.

Since the Board of Governors is also under GES, it also has no legal capacity to respond.

The court, presided over by Justice Gifty Agyei Addo, had a contrary view.

Justice Agyei Addo said she was working with the order for all parties in the case to file their responses.

She then gave the interested parties another opportunity to file their responses before the next court date, April 30.

The court also issued the same directive in the other Rastafarian student Oheneba Nkrabea’s case. Achimota School failed to respond to the suit filed by the student.

The genesis of the problem

A parent of one of the affected students, Ras Aswad Nkrabea, took to social media to express his frustration over the development.

“The school authorities denied two brilliant dreadlocked students from being admitted, after having been posted there by the Computer School Placement System.

“My son was one of the affected children, and the other student was also refused on the same grounds,” the disappointed father narrated in a Facebook post.

This generated a public uproar, with a section of Ghanaians calling out the school for discriminating against the students.

Breach of Right to Education

The development sparked public outrage on social media, with a section of the public condemning the actions of the authorities at Achimota School.

The Executive Director of the Africa Education Watch, Kofi Asare, vehemently condemned the decision of the school to deny the Rastafarian students admission.

Article 25 of the 1992 Constitution of Ghana establishes the right of the Ghanaian citizenry to have access to equal educational opportunities and facilities.

Mr Asare pointed out that the authorities at Achimota School have breached this provision of the constitution.

“The issue of education being a right is explicit in Article 25 of the 1992 Constitution… Section 3 and 8 of Act 560 explicitly states that no person shall discriminate against a child on the grounds of Religion and Custom.

“And in section A, the same Act provides that no person shall deprive the child access to education.  Based on Article 25 of our constitution and its attendant regulations in the Children’s Act, no agency in this country has the right to deprive a child of the right to education.

“They’re wrong. I’m not the one saying they’re wrong. The Act of Parliament, Act 560, Section A is saying they’re wrong because they have discriminated against the child and denied the child his right to education,” Mr Asare said in an earlier interview.

It is almost an annual ordeal for Rastafarian families to be denied admission into second cycle institutions due to their dreadlocks.

Kofi Asare charged the Rastafarian Council of Ghana to go to court to end their frustrations.

Previous incident

The practice of school authorities turning away Ghanaian students with dreadlocks is an old one.

In September 2017, a teenager was denied admission into Accra Girls Senior High School because she had dreadlocks.

According to the father, his daughter is a Rastafarian, and it was against their religion to cut off the locks.

The distraught father said efforts to explain issues to school authorities proved futile.

He was convinced the school’s decision to deny his daughter admission is borne out of ignorance.