A Techiman farmer has taken the government to the Supreme Court over licensing fees that critics say turn a legal industry into an exclusive club, filing her constitutional challenge just one day after the state officially launched Ghana’s Cannabis Regulatory Programme on February 26, 2026.
Mariam Alhassan, represented by lawyer Amanda Akuokor Clinton, invoked the original jurisdiction of the apex court on February 27 to challenge the industrial hemp licensing framework established under the Narcotics Control Commission (Amendment) Act, 2023 (Act 1100) and the Narcotics Control Commission (NACOC) Cultivation and Management of Cannabis Regulations, 2023 (L.I. 2475).
The timing is striking. Interior Minister Muntaka Mohammed-Mubarak stood before reporters in Accra on Thursday, calling the programme a world-class initiative for building a Ghanaian-led industrial hemp sector. By Friday morning, Alhassan’s lawyers had walked into the Supreme Court and filed a suit arguing that ordinary Ghanaians cannot afford to participate in it.
At the centre of the legal challenge is a fee structure that Alhassan says is unconstitutional in design and effect. Cultivation licence fees can reach up to 45,000 US dollars per hectare in some categories, denominated in US dollars rather than cedis, meaning every exchange-rate fluctuation becomes a direct cost to prospective farmers. On top of those fees, the framework imposes recurring annual charges calculated as a percentage of the licence value, payable regardless of whether a farmer actually produces anything.
The suit also challenges requirements for narcotics-style transport permits and armed security escorts when moving harvested hemp within Ghana. Industrial hemp under the programme is legally defined as containing no more than 0.3 percent tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the same non-psychoactive grade found in hemp cosmetics, body care products, and food supplements that enter Ghana through ordinary commercial import channels every day with no such controls.
That disparity forms the constitutional tension Alhassan places before the court. If a hemp-based lotion or oil imported from abroad faces standard commercial clearance, she argues, it is irrational to treat a Ghanaian farmer growing the same grade of plant as a high-risk narcotics activity requiring layers of government security.
Her legal team is asking the court to declare the framework inconsistent with Articles 17, 23, 36, and 296 of the 1992 Constitution, which cover equality, administrative justice, directive principles of state policy, and the control of discretionary power. The suit further argues that the high cumulative fees effectively function as taxation, violating Article 174, which vests the power to impose taxes exclusively in Parliament.
The defendants named in the filing are the Ministry for the Interior, NACOC, the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, and the Attorney-General.
Alhassan is also seeking an interim order to suspend enforcement of the disputed fees, levies, and transport requirements while the case is heard.
The constitutional battle is the latest chapter in a difficult history for hemp regulation in Ghana. Parliament first legalised industrial hemp cultivation in 2020 under the original Narcotics Control Commission Act, but a 2022 Supreme Court ruling struck down the relevant provision on procedural grounds, finding that it was introduced without the required parliamentary debate and explanatory memorandum. Parliament passed a corrective amendment in July 2023, which provided the legal foundation for the programme the Minister launched last Thursday.
The new case does not challenge Parliament’s authority to regulate hemp. It challenges how the executive has exercised that authority and asks whether the resulting framework can survive constitutional scrutiny when its practical effect is to reserve the industry for well-capitalised operators while excluding smallholder farmers.
The Supreme Court has yet to indicate when it will hear the matter.
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