His Lordship Justice Nasiru Sulemana Gbadegbe broke down in tears while addressing a gathering of Supreme Court judges on his retirement day.
He delivered his valedictory judgement today, December 3, 2020, in the case of David Apasera & 39 Ors v. Attorney General and others after 11 years of service on the Supreme Court Bench.
He was appointed in 2009 by President John Evans Atta Mills of blessed memory after a decade of service at the High Court (1989 to 1999) and a subsequent ten years at the Court of Appeal (1999 to 2009).
The late Professor Mills swore him into the Supreme Court in November 2009 after a unanimous Parliamentary approval of his nomination.
He was however appointed to both the High Court and the Court of Appeal by President Jerry John Rawlings, now late.
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The 70 year-old schooled at the University of Ghana where he obtained his Bachelor of laws degree (LLB) in 1975, and subsequently at the Ghana School of Law for his professional law qualification in 1975.
As early as 2009, Justice Gbadegbe was one of the few voices advocating for the computerization of the Court system and processes to enable the Courts to dispense of cases speedily without compromising justice.
He was one of the justices said to have been attacked with verbal invective in a case that infamously came to be called the Montie 3 case.
This was in the course of the 2012 election petition hearing when an NDC commentator, Godwin Ako Gunn thought Justice Gbadegbe and then Chief Justice Wood were promoting an NPP agenda and threatened on live radio to kill them.
Mr. Gunn was subsequently held in contempt of the court; the proceedings of which Justice Gbadegbe and Chief Justice recused themselves from.
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He was also part of the nine Justices that adjudicated the infamous 2012 election petition.
The emotionally looking Justice Gbadegbe eventually lost his voice in a packed courtroom with the remaining 16 justices of the apex court now before him including Chief Justice Kwasi Anin Yeboah.
The Chief Justice, Justice Jones Dotse, the president of the Ghana Bar Association, Anthony Forson Jnr, and Deputy Attorney General Godfred Yeboah Dame all took turns to pay tributes to his long service to the nation.