Supreme Court to rule on voters register May 5

The Supreme Court will give its ruling on a suit by a former National Youth Organiser of the People’s National Convention (PNC), Abu Ramadan, and Evans Nimako against the Electoral Commission (EC) over the credibility of the current voters register on May 5, 2016.

The court  fixed the date after all the parties involved in the case had informed the court yesterday that they would not make any oral arguments but rather rely on their respective statements of case to support their cases.

PNC dismissed

The seven-member panel, presided over by the Chief Justice, Mrs Justice Georgina Theodora Wood, also dismissed an application by the PNC to join the suit as the second plaintiff.

Counsel for the PNC, Dr Raymond Atuguba, had prayed the court to use its discretionary powers to allow the PNC to join the suit.

He further argued that the court should substitute the original plaintiffs with the PNC because, as a political party, it had more interest in the case than the original plaintiffs.

Making his case, he said the PNC could be a prospective party to the suit because it stood to gain or lose upon the determination of the case.

“Given the reliefs sought by the plaintiffs, it is appropriate to join the applicant (PNC) to achieve an effectual resolution of the case,” he said.

He cited the National Democratic Congress (NDC) which successfully made an application to join the election petition filed by the New Patriotic Party (NPP) against the EC and President John Mahama.

One of the panel members, Mr Justice Jones Mawulom Dotse, at that point asked counsel why the PNC wanted to join the suit as a plaintiff, even though its application to that effect was at variance with the interest of the original plaintiffs.

Dr Atuguba, in response, told the court that the court had the discretion to join the applicant to the suit. 

Ruling

In its ruling on the matter read by the Chief Justice which lasted less than a minute, the court dismissed the application, stating that it lacked merit.

“We find no merit in the application. It is, therefore, dismissed,’’ it held.

 Panel 

The seven-member panel included Mr Justice Anin Yeboah, Mr Justice Dotse, Mr Justice Baffoe-Bonnie and  Mr Justice Joseph Bawa Akamba.

The rest were Mr Justice Anthony A. Benin and Mr Justice Sule N. Gbadegbe.

Database

A contentious issue which came up during yesterday’s proceeding was whether the EC had a database which captured the various documentations which were used by people to register during the 2012 biometric registration and the 2014 limited registration exercises.

 Mr Justice Dotse asked counsel for the EC, Mr Thaddeus Sory, whether the EC had a database which indicated whether someone used an existing voter identification card, a passport, a driving licence or the National Health Insurance Scheme card to register as a voter.

Mr Sory, after consulting with the Chairman of the EC, Mrs Charlotte Osei, and other officials of the commission for about 15 minutes, told the court that the EC, indeed, had a voters registration database but “it does not reflect the type of identification that was used for the registration exercise”.

He, however, stated that such information could be extracted from the documents which were used to manually capture the bio-data of those who registered.

That attracted a strong rebuttal from counsel for the plaintiffs, Nana Asante Bediatuo, who informed the court that during a meeting among the counsel in the case, they were informed by the EC that it had no means to locate the types of documents that were used by the people to register during the 2012 voters registration and 2014 limited registration exercises.

Reliefs

The plaintiffs in their suit are seeking the following reliefs:

(a) An order setting aside the current voters register and compelling the EC to compile a fresh voters register before the conduct of any new public election or referendum in the country;

Or in the alternative

(b) An order compelling the EC to audit the current voters register through the validation of the registration of each person currently on the register.

Quick read

The Supreme Court has set May 5, 2016 as the date to give its ruling on a suit by a former National Youth Organiser of the People’s National Convention (PNC), Abu Ramadan, and Evans Nimako against the Electoral Commission (EC) over the credibility of the current voters register.