Gabby Otchere-Darko Warns Ghana’s Supreme Court Against Altering Two-Term Presidential Limit
- NPP figure Gabby Otchere-Darko criticised a case before the Supreme Court seeking to reinterpret Ghana's presidential two-term limit
- Otchere-Darko argued that accepting the consecutive-terms interpretation would effectively reset the constitutional limit
- He said reading the word 'consecutive' into a constitution that deliberately omits it amounts to amendment by judicial decree, not interpretation
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Gabby Otchere-Darko, a prominent member of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), has publicly challenged a case before Ghana's Supreme Court that seeks to reinterpret the constitutional two-term presidential limit as applying only to consecutive terms in office.
He said, the case, if successful, would mean a sitting president who completes a second term could legally contest future elections after a break, with the two-term clock resetting each time they step away from the presidency.
Source: UGC
Otchere-Darko's argument against presidential term limit case
In a post on X on Friday, July 10, 2026, Otchere-Darko dismantled the logic of that position by tracing its implications to their natural conclusion.
Under such an interpretation, he argued, a president finishing a second term could run again in 2028, and if defeated, return in 2032.
"If he wins in 2032, he could contest again in 2036 because, according to this theory, he still would not have served two consecutive terms. If he then loses in 2036, why stop there? He could run again in 2040, and if he wins, he could still seek another term in 2044 because only then would he have completed two back-to-back terms," he wrote
"In other words, under this interpretation, the Constitution's two-term limit magically resets every time a President loses a re-election attempt, That is not interpreting the Constitution. It is rewriting it," he added.
He pointed to the actual language of the Constitution, which states that a president shall not hold office for more than two terms, without any reference to those terms being consecutive.
Otchere-Darko stressed that the framers of the Constitution were fully capable of including the word "consecutive" had they intended that qualification, and their decision not to do so was deliberate.
Otchere-Darko warns against judicial amendment
The NPP stalwart drew a sharp distinction between constitutional interpretation and what he characterised as constitutional amendment through the courts.
He contended that asking judges to insert language the framers chose to leave out, adding that it is not a function of judicial interpretation but an exercise of legislative power that the Supreme Court does not possess.
"Asking the Supreme Court to read into the Constitution a word its framers deliberately omitted is not constitutional interpretation; it is constitutional amendment by judicial decree," he said.
Otchere-Darko warned that endorsing this reading would transform Ghana's lifetime two-term ceiling on the presidency into a simple prohibition on serving two terms consecutively, which he described as "an entirely different proposition."
Read Otchere-Darko's X post below:
Kuranchie heads to court over two-term limit
Meanwhile, YEN.com.gh reported that a veteran Ghanaian journalist and lawyer Kenneth Kuranchie filed a writ at the Supreme Court, challenging Ghana's presidential term limit.
Kuranchie argued that Article 66(2) of the 1992 Constitution only bars consecutive two-term service/
If the court rules in his favour, President John Dramani Mahama could become eligible to contest a third presidential term.
Source: YEN.com.gh
