Supreme Court puts Akwatia MP’s sentencing on hold

The Supreme Court has by a 4-1 majority decision stayed the High Court in Koforidua from sentencing the Member of Parliament for Akwatia Constituency, Ernest Kumi thus the MP will not be convicted of contempt until the final determination of a motion seeking to quash the ruling. 

Justice Gabriel Pwamang dissented while the four other members of the panel approved the stay.

Earlier, the court fixed March 12, 2025, to determine whether or not to hear the convicted MP on a motion seeking to set aside an injunction restraining him from holding himself as an MP without purging himself at the High Court which convicted him.

Justice Pwamang insisted that the Supreme Court could not give counsel audience in a court of law since his client had not answered to the contempt judgment at the High Court.

“We are doubting our right to accord you a hearing, until that one is dealt with I don’t think it’s appropriate to assume that we should be making orders,” Justice Pwamang said in response to Mr Marfo who had prayed the court to make orders directed at the High Court before adjourning the matter

The other  members of the bench were Justices Henrietta Mensa-Bonsu, Ernest Gaewu, Henry Anthony Kwofie and Richard Adjei-Frimpong.

The ruling barring the Supreme Court came after the court heard a prayer from counsel for Kumi, Gary Nimako Marfo, to bar Justice Senyo Amedahe, who convicted the MP from proceeding to sentence him.

However, Bernard Bediako, counsel for the first interested party, Boakye Yiadom, opposed the prayer saying granting the order for stay would lead to the grant of a relief of the substantive application seeking to quash the High Court ruling on the contempt.

The case has been adjourned to March 12, 2025. 

MP

On January 3, 2025, the court issued an interim injunction preventing Kumi’s swearing-in.

This followed a lawsuit filed by Henry Boakye-Yiadom, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) parliamentary candidate and former MP, against the Electoral Commission (EC), Kumi, and the Clerk to Parliament.

The lawsuit challenged the election results which declared Kumi the winner with 19,269 votes against Boakye-Yiadom’s 17,206 votes.

Despite the injunction, Kumi proceeded to be sworn in on January 7, 2025.

In an earlier ruling in January, the court dismissed an application by Kumi’s legal team, led by Mr Nimako, seeking to set aside the interim injunction.

Conviction

In February this year, the court issued a bench warrant for the arrest of Mr Kumi, after finding him guilty of contempt

Specifically, Justice Amedahe issued the order after it considered that the MP defied an injunction barring him from being sworn in as a Member of Parliament (MP) for the area on January 7, 2025.

The judge explained that Kumi had been absent from court since the contempt proceedings began, prompting the issuance of the warrant for his arrest.

Justice Amedahe noted that throughout the hearing of the contempt case, Kumi failed to appear in person before the court.

The court also rejected a letter from the Minority Caucus of Parliament, which claimed that the MP was occupied with parliamentary duties, and therefore, unable to attend court.

Cetioriri

In a motion on notice for an order for certiorari and prohibition filed at the Supreme Court, the MP through his counsel contended that the High Court judge committed a jurisdictional error of law on the face of the record when he assumed jurisdiction in Parliamentary Election Petition at Akwatia Constituency at the time when the Electoral Commission had not published the Gazette Notification.

The MP argued that the High Court Judge breached the rules of natural justice when he proceeded to hear and determine the contempt application despite the pendency of his (the MP) motion to set aside the said contempt application for want of jurisdiction.

According to him, the High Court Judge was also biased and highly prejudiced against him when he, among others, refused to grant his counsel audience on the basis that counsel had not filed “Appearance” in the contempt application.

The MP is seeking a declaration that the Petition filed by Henry Boakye-Yiadom, the first Interested Party (IP) on December 31, 2024 in the absence of the Gazette Notification of the Parliamentary Election Result to which the election relates was incompetent  as same did not properly invoke the jurisdiction of the High Court, and that “any order founded on the same is void  and of no effect.”

Mr Kumi is also seeking a “declaration that the Contempt Proceedings and Ruling dated 19th February 2025, found on premature election petition filed on 31st December 2024 is void and of no effect”.  

The MP is further praying for an order of certiorari from the Supreme Court quashing the Koforidua High Court ruling dated February 19, 2025, the petition filed on December 31, 2024 and Interim Injunction order on January 2, 2025, and ruling on January 6, 2025, made pursuant to the said premature Election Petition, filed on December 31, 2024.