Election 2020
We Made Maths Errors, But It Didn’t Affect The Election Results – EC Tells Supreme Court
The Electoral Commission of Ghana, the 1st Respondent in former President John Mahama’s election petition, has averred that “the full results of the 7 December 2020 presidential election” were “known to the Petitioner and that the claims in the petition are contrived, have no legal basis and ought to be dismissed in limine”.
The EC also denied “all allegations of vote-padding contained in the petition”.
In its response to the petition of the presidential candidate of the main opposition National Democratic Congress in the recently-held general elections, the election management body stated that “notwithstanding all the resources and training deployed and the facilities put in place, there is a possibility of minor discrepancies as a result of computational and mathematical errors made in the course of the collation of the results but these did not have a material effect on the overall results as declared.”
The EC, on 10 December 2020, a day after declaring the presidential results, effected a correction of the total valid votes via a press statement.
It said instead of the 13,434,574 announced by EC Chair Jean Mensa as the total number of valid votes, it was 13,121,111, adding that Mr Mahama was, therefore, “well aware that 13,434,574 was an error”.
“1st Respondent states that the petition ought to be dismissed also because the Petitioner does not challenge the validity of the election conducted throughout the 38,622 polling stations and the 311 special voting centres in the country, or contest the lawfulness of votes obtained by any of the parties to the election”.
“1st Respondent adds that the petitioner has failed to indicate the exact number of votes and percentages that he or the other candidates ought to have obtained in comparison to the number of votes and percentages declared by the 1st Petitioner”.
“The 1st Respondent, accordingly, raises a preliminary legal objection to the petition as being incompetent and not, as required by article 64(1) of the Constitution and Rule 68(1) of the Supreme Court rules 1996 (CI 16), as amended, amounting to a challenge of the validity of the presidential election conducted by the 1st Respondent on 7 December 2020”.
“Wherefore, the 1st Respondent prays the petition and all the grounds in support thereof, be summarily dismissed by this honourable court for not disclosing any reasonable cause of action”, the EC’s response prayed the court.
Mahama argues that only the public declaration made by Mrs Mensa on 9 December 2020 is guaranteed by the Constitution, and further that all the subsequent corrections were unconstitutional, and in any case declared through unsigned documents, which make them no declarations at all.
Mahama further avers that any such corrections should have been done in the presence of the representatives of the candidates and that the errors go beyond inadvertent mistakes.
The case will be heard from 14 January and judgement is expected to be given within 42 days.
Source: ClassfmOnline
Election 2020
Supreme Court Orders Mahama’s Lawyers To Comply With Their Orders By Wednesday Or Face Sanctions
The Seven-member Supreme Court panel hearing the 2020 Election Petition has ordered the legal team of John Mahama to comply with its orders and file their witness statements by close of Wednesday.
The Court also warned that failure to comply with their order will attract sanctions as imposed by law.
The caution follows an explanation by Counsel for the Petitioner, Tony Lithur that they had opted not to file witness statements as ordered by the court due to pending applications earlier filed.
According to him, Mr. Mahama has filed a stay of proceedings along with an application for the apex court to review the dismissal of his permission to serve the EC some 12 interrogatories.
However, the court insisted that it’s earlier order must be complied with, failure of which can result in the dismissal of the petition.
Source: GhanaFeed.Com
Election 2020
Just In: Mahama’s Lawyer Hot In Court For Failing To Obey The Orders Of The Supreme Court
Tony Lithur, lawyer for the petitioner in the 2020 Election Petition, John Dramani Mahama has come under severe fire this morning at the Supreme Court following his team’s failure to comply with the order of the Apex Court.
Legal team for John Mahama failed to comply with an order of the Supreme Court which instructed them to file witness statements pending the hearing of the substantive petition.
According to Mr Lithur, their failure to comply with the order of the Court is because of their review of the court’s earlier decision on their interrogatories.
However, a visibly unenthused seven-member panel would have none of the excuses.
After minutes of back and forth between the bench and Mr Lithur, the court has suspended sitting briefly to consider the issues.
More Soon….
Source: GhanaFeed.Com
Election 2020
Dismiss Mahama’s Review Application And Charge Him Money For Wasting The Court’s Time – Akufo-Addo’s Lawyer Tells Supreme Court
Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and his lawyers have opposed the review application by former President John Dramani Mahama for a review of the Supreme Court ruling on his interrogatories.
In his affidavit in opposition to the application, Akufo-Addo, the 2nd Respondent in the petition before the apex court said the review application should “be dismissed with punitive costs”
A seven-member panel of the Supreme Court on Tuesday, January 19, refused to grant a request by the petitioner to serve the EC with some 12 interrogatories it found relevant to the petition.
Following the dismissal of the motion, the petitioner has applied to the court for a review of that decision.
However, Mr Akufo-Addo in his response to the motion for review said ” from the ratio of decided cases, it is immaterial if the petitioner considers the decision of the ordinary court to be wrong in law and hold any other reason apart from what he has stipulated in rule 54 of the Supreme Court Rules 1996 (CI 16).
“Based on the strict conditions set out in Rule 54 of CI 16 and the plethora of authorities that elucidate that Rule, we submit that the petitioner has not satisfied the court that he ought to be granted a review of the ruling delivered on 19th January 2021.”
He, therefore, prayed for the instant application to be dismissed with punitive costs.
The panel of seven presided over by Chief Justice Kwasi Anin Yeboah are expected to consider the issues in Tuesday’s sitting.
Source: 3news
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