On this day, August 16, 1969 the constituent assembly approved the draft constitution setting the stage for elections for the return to constitutional governance in Ghana. This was to end the 3 years of military rule from February 1966, when the Nkrumah government was overthrown.
The Constitution of the second Republic, a voluminous documents comprising 177 articles, divided the executive power between the president and the cabinet headed by the Prime Minister. The powers of the president were however far less important than under the 1960 Constitution, while the prime minister wielded the real executive power. Another reaction to the later despotism of the First Republic, was the firm guarantees of human rights and freedoms embodied in the fourth chapter of the 1969 Constitution. The elections following this Constitution, were won by the progress party led by Dr. K.A. Busia, with an overwhelming majority, which may have been one of the causes of his downfall, making it too easy to be insensitive to criticism and to ignore the opposition in and outside of Parliament.