V. C. R. A. C. Crabbe

Vincent Cyril Richard Arthur Charles Crabbe, known as V. C. R. A. C. Crabbe, was a judge and constitutional draftsman who set up Ghana's first electoral commission, chaired the assembly that wrote the 1979 Constitution, and drafted constitutions for Uganda and Kenya. He was born at Ussher Town in Accra on 29 October 1923 and died on 7 September 2018.

The draftsman

His father, the Chief Registrar of the Gold Coast courts, died before his first birthday. After Accra Academy he worked as a police clerk and was in the crowd gathering intelligence during the 1948 riots. He went to London to study economics, switched to law and was called to the bar in 1955. At the Attorney-General's department he helped draft the laws passed on the eve of independence, and in 1958 became the first African parliamentary counsel. Nkrumah sent him to Uganda, where he drafted its 1966 constitution.

Elections, courts and constitutions

As interim electoral commissioner from 1968 he built the commission that ran the 1969 elections. He sat on the Supreme Court from 1970 to 1972 and again from 1980 to 1981, and chaired the 1979 Constituent Assembly. He directed the Commonwealth's training scheme for legislative draftsmen for 24 years, led the drafting team for Kenya's constitution in 2002, and as Statute Law Revision Commissioner from 1999 to 2014 revised the laws of Ghana from 1852 to 2004. He co-chaired the election observer coalition CODEO and was teaching law at Mountcrest University College when he died.