Justice Baffoe-Bonnie reveals why he left Prison Service after meeting Junior officer who later became his wife

Chief Justice nominee Justice Paul Baffoe-Bonnie has shared a deeply personal account of how he met his wife, and the sacrifice he made to secure her future in the security services.

Appearing before Parliament’s Appointments Committee on Monday, November 10, he recounted his professional journey from legal practice to the Ghana Prison Service, a path that led him to Patience Baffoe-Bonnie, now the Director-General of the Ghana Prisons Service.

Justice Baffoe-Bonnie told the Committee he practised law for nine years, five years in the chambers of Tackie Otoo in Sekondi and four years in Kejetia, Kumasi, where he worked with the late Sir John.

“In 1988, I joined the Ghana Prison Service. After six months of military training, I was posted to Sekondi; that’s where I met my wife,” he said.

He recalled that his wife, then a recruit with no rank, was just beginning her career.

“At the time, she was only starting; she didn’t have any rank, actually,” he noted.

Justice Baffoe-Bonnie served as a Deputy Superintendent of Prisons until 1990, when he was confronted with a regulation that prohibited senior officers from marrying junior officers because they could not dine at the same mess.

“We were told that I, as a senior officer, could not marry a junior officer because we couldn’t go to the mess together,” he said. “So I opted out of the Prison Service so that she could stay.”

His decision cleared the path for Mrs Patience Baffoe-Bonnie to rise through the ranks, a journey that has now seen her appointed to the highest office in the Ghana Prisons Service.

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