EC complies with court order to provide election documents for inspection

The Electoral Commission has complied with the Wenchi High Court’s order to provide Dr Christopher Beyere Baasongti, the petitioner in the Techiman South Constituency election case, election documents for inspection.

According to the registrar of the Wenchi High Court, Kwabena Osei, the EC was able to provide all the original documents but the court later detected that two copies of the documents were not original.

Briefing the media after the inspection, the registrar said the original copies of the two documents were later provided.

Before the inspection was carried out yesterday, journalists in the court room were ordered out by the registrar of the court saying that the media was not allowed in court sitting.

It will be recalled that during the last sitting, the court awarded a cost of GH¢2000 to the petitioner to be paid by the EC due to the electoral body’s failure to properly produce documents as directed by the court.

At that sitting, the second respondent filed photocopies of the documents to the petitioner instead of the original documents.

Immediately after the inspection, the NDC officials made photocopies of the documents provided amidst heavy security.

The petitioner brought his own photocopier machine being powered by generator, with the anticipation that light may go off and it did for some time before it was restored.

Spokesperson for the petitioner[R11]   and General Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Mr Johnson Aseidu Nketiah, said although the documents had been provided there were issues surrounding some of them.

He said the issues would be raised in the court during the next sitting.

Mr Richard Asamoah, Regional Secretary of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) in Techiman South constituency, called for circumspection regarding commentaries on the court proceedings,

He said the court had been fair to both sides which must be respected.

FROM DANIEL DZIRASAH, WENCHI