IMANI Africa President Franklin Cudjoe says Chief Justice Paul Baffoe-Bonnie did nothing wrong by commenting on the performance of state institutions under successive governments.

He argues that the Chief Justice was expressing an opinion during a discussion on governance and had not breached any law or made a judicial pronouncement.

“Which law has he broken?” Mr Cudjoe asked on Eyewitness on Thursday, September 3.

His comments follow criticism from the New Patriotic Party (NPP), which has demanded that the Chief Justice retract remarks it considers partisan or resign and formally join the National Democratic Congress (NDC).

The controversy follows the circulation of a video in which Justice Baffoe-Bonnie is heard saying:

“Sometimes when we hear how well some state organisations are doing now, we wonder what we really have been doing in the past eight years.”

But Mr Cudjoe said the circumstances in which the comment was made were important.

“He wasn’t sitting in court making judgments on public enterprises. He was on a call together with others, and they were giving them scenarios,” he said.

He maintained that the Chief Justice was responding to information presented to him about the performance of state institutions and was not using his judicial authority to make a determination.

Mr Cudjoe also urged political actors to focus on addressing governance failures rather than turning the comments into a partisan dispute.

“All you should do is sit down, go back, look at all the problems you created, provide solutions. That’s what we are actually supposed to do,” he said.

He maintained that the comments did not make the Chief Justice an “errant speaker” and did not provide grounds for his resignation.