Thursday,
February 7, 2013
The lawsuit filed by the NPP is
gradually exposing a lot that we must continue to interrogate as we monitor the
developments unfolding right in front of our eyes.
I am still struggling with the
rationale behind the NPP’s lawsuit and want to raise some nagging aspects for
our discussion. What exactly is the NPP in court to achieve? And how will that
achievement add any value to our democracy?
One major justification that the
party’s leaders and supporters used to support the court action was that it
would help us refine our democracy and curtail future manipulation of the
electoral process. They haven’t ceased couching their claims in that fluff.
But I don’t see how this lawsuit
will do anything of the sort. Plainly put, how can the demand that the Supreme
Court annul 4,670,504 valid votes
cast at the 2012 polls and declare Akufo-Addo as winner of the Presidential
elections add any value to our democracy? On what basis is this “value” being
framed as such? What will make anything of the sort a “value,” at all?
If the NPP were,
indeed, seeking to use this lawsuit to add value to our democracy, why didn’t
the petitioners even ask for a re-run of the general elections should their
allegations be substantiated? They haven’t done so because it is not their
focus. What they are looking for is that their Akufo-Addo should be declared
the winner after over 4 million votes have been annulled. How inconceivable?
How do you add
value to a democracy when the votes of over 4 million citizens guaranteed the
right of franchise are annulled for no apparent reason but just because one
political party is peeved that it didn’t win the elections and has fingered
that quantum of votes as the cause? What sort of democracy will this skewed and
dangerous desire build for us?
Again,
if the NPP sought to use this lawsuit to help us deepen our democracy, why didn’t
the petitioners ask for “electoral reforms” as part of the reliefs that they demanded
in their petition? Or, why haven’t they suggested anything other than the
insistence that Akufo-Addo be declared winner of the elections? What will
declaring Akufo-Addo as such add to our democracy?
This
is where the morbidity of the petition comes to full view. And, for me, this is
the crux of the matter.
I
am more persuaded by the stance taken by Dr. Paa Kwesi Nduom and his PPP that
even though they had their own reasons for doubting the fairness or
transparency of the elections, they didn’t support the NPP’s lawsuit. Instead,
they would strongly urge that electoral reforms be carried out to improve the
general elections in future. Fair enough because no general elections held
anywhere in the world are without problems, being conducted by human beings—and
we know that perfection is not a human quality!
Improving
the electoral process isn’t the responsibility of the Supreme Court but the
very institutions charged with conducting elections or participating in such
elections which, in our case are the Electoral Commission and the various
political parties. That responsibility is outside the Supreme Court’s purview.
Indeed,
the primary responsibility of the Supreme Court is the interpretation of the
country’s laws, especially the Constitution. As it is known to function, the
Supreme Court won’t choose leaders for the country. It will determine cases
brought before it on how the leaders are chosen to see whether the laws or
constitutional stipulations guiding the procedures for choosing such leaders
have been duly followed or not. Its interpretation may give us some ideas on
what should be done, but the Court can’t make kings because that is not its
constitutional mandate.
That
is why it will look into this lawsuit to see if the procedures were flouted,
and call for a re-run of the elections if it so determines. That is why the NPP
petitioners’ exclusion of a re-run deepens the morbidity of their petition.
And
that is why I strongly opine that in determining this NPP lawsuit, the Supreme
Court will focus on the Constitutional provisions regarding the conduct of the
elections to determine whether the Electoral Commission followed the
stipulations regarding the 2012 elections. It will interpret the Constitutional
provisions against the background of the NPP’s allegations to tell us whether
the EC fell out of step or not.
I
can assume at this stage that the Court will also examine all the evidence to
be made available and determine the case within that ambit to see which
Constitutional provisions were flouted or adhered to, and the implications.
It
is only then that it can tell us whether the general elections were grossly
misconducted or properly conducted in accordance with the Constitutional
provisions. Or whether there should be a re-run or not. But that is not what
the NPP is interested in.
From
the Court’s response to the NPP petitioners’ request for the pink sheets from
the EC (which it threw out today), we can see clearly how the wind is blowing.
Not only did the Court say that the petitioners’ demand was "pre-mature,
superfluous, and unnecessary" but it also said that the
petitioners were represented in the EC’s strong room as we well as on the
ground on Election Day and they should have copies of the collation sheets and
the pink sheets.
So,
I am beginning to have a hunch that the Supreme Court is gradually opening a
window for us to see early the ebb and flow of this case. That is why it is
meticulously making sure that the preliminary legal issues are dealt with to
clear doubts on what it will do as an interpreter of the Constitution and not a
king-maker.
The
Court has so far given its ruling on those preliminary issues, the latest of
which today revealed to me that it is set to do its interpretation of the
electoral laws as stipulated in the Constitution. Two of those rulings have a
direct bearing on the legal technicalities that the Court is helping us see
clearly.
By
granting the petitioners an application for leave to amend their petition
within two days, the Court has helped the NPP to deepen its challenges. The
petitioners will now amend their original petition asking the Supreme Court to
annul 4,670,504 valid votes cast during the elections in 11,916 polling
stations (instead of the earlier 4,709) where alleged irregularities were
recorded.
Pronto!!
This amendment means the petitioners will have to provide “further and better
particulars” to the respondents—regardless of what they have already been ordered
to provide in respect of the 4,709 polling stations contained in the original
petition.
Today alone, the Supreme Court ruled on four different
applications filed by petitioners and respondents in the case relating to the petition
challenging the results of the 2012 Presidential elections.
If the NPP were
interested in improving our democracy, why would its legal team be objecting to
the NDC’s being joined to the lawsuit and protesting against a basic legal
procedure such as providing “further and better particulars” to the respondents
to enable them know what the real contents of the NPP’s allegations are so they
can position themselves for defence?
Or, why would the
NPP petitioners not know that they would acting prematurely and superfluously
by asking the Court to order the EC to give them the pink sheets—all after they
had already publicly dangled those very documents (or imitations?) at press
conferences and other public forums, which they called their “watertight
evidence”?
How would they not
know that the burden of proof was on them and not the plaintiffs to be
demanding from the plaintiffs the very documents that they had used as the
basis for their allegations? Or did they not make those allegations because
they had what confirmed their fears, doubts, and suspicions about the conduct
of the general elections?
Even, lay people
like us know that what the NPP was demanding from the EC won’t be granted by
the Court; and we were proved right.
As the legal
technicalities continue to be cleared or new ones emerge, we will continue to
monitor the situation to see how the case will be steered to a pure
constitutional responsibility of law interpretation to be performed by the
Supreme Court. I am more than persuaded that by the time the dust settles,
those expecting that the Supreme Court will declare Akufo-Addo as the winner of
Election 2012 will become so disillusioned as to wonder whether it was
political expedient at all to seek redress in the dark chambers of the Supreme
Court.
They need to know
right now that king-making is indeed not a constitutional responsibility thrust
upon the Supreme Court. Its main function in this lawsuit is to interpret the Constitutional
provisions regulating the electoral process.
So, I end this
opinion piece with the very question that set me off: What exactly is the NPP
in court to add to our democracy?
To confirm that Dr.
Kwadwo Afari Gyan stole the elections for President Mahama and must be removed
from office and the entire Electoral Commission overhauled? That the general
elections were fraught with irregularities, tampering with votes, outright
stealing of votes for President Mahama, or flouting of the electoral process
because not all polling stations adhered to the Biometric Verification
Procedures? That 28 “illegal” polling stations were haphazardly created to
attract votes for President Mahama? And that annulling 4,670,504 valid votes will be the best action to be taken in consequence?
And,
above all, that despite all these “irregularities,” there shouldn’t be any
re-run of the elections; and that instead, the elections should be declared in
favour of Akufo-Addo? What sort of value will anything of this sort add to
Ghana’s democracy?
As it was in the
beginning, so shall it be in the end. I ask again: Why is the NPP in court,
dear reader?
I
shall return…
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E-mail:
mjbokor@yahoo.com
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