A member of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) legal team, Abraham Amaliba says any action by the Judicial Services Staff Association of Ghana (JUSAG) to embark on a strike ahead of the Supreme Court verdict will backfire.

He said the timing of the strike was a bad one and any action in that regard will make members of JUSAG villains.

“I think that they will become villains, they will become the most hated group of persons if they embark on this strike,” he said on Accra-based Joy FM.

On Tuesday, August 20, JUSAG served notice that it will embark on an industrial action on August 27, if all outstanding allowances due its members are not paid by August 26.

Expressing his dissatisfaction with JUSAG, Mr Amaliba noted that “the entire country is waiting with bated breath for the ruling and if they think that they want to use this occasion to get what they want, I’m telling them that it will backfire”.

“Because at this point, if they succeed in thwarting what is going to happen on Thursday, they’ll be seen as nation wreckers, they will be viewed in a negative light and what they are requesting for nobody will have sympathy for them. If they think that they want to use this to draw sympathy for themselves, it will backfire,” he added.

Calling of the case

On his part, a member of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Nii Ayikoi Otoo noted that JUSAG’s decision to embark on a strike would have no effect on the judgement day.

He said all what the justices had to do was to call the case and go on to deliver the judgement.

Sympathising with members of JUSAG, Nii Ayikoi Otoo said JUSAG was taking an opportunity from the situation that the nation happened to find itself in.

“In all fairness to them, you strike the iron when it is hot and therefore, the timing for them is to create a panic situation so that desperate measures will look for solutions. But I don’t think that it will affect the judgement.

“I’m aware that judges were trained to type their own judgement, therefore, each judge can type their own judgement. Secondly, it’s a matter of calling the case and then going ahead and delivering the judgement,” he added.

Nii Ayikoi Otoo explained further that in such a situation the protocol greetings would not be followed.

Meanwhile, government has expressed its readiness to discuss and address the concerns of members of JUSAG and has subsequently asked the association to reconsider the industrial action it plans to begin on August 27.