Charlotte Osei
The lawyer representing some unnamed workers of the Electoral Commission (EC) who are seeking the impeachment of the Chairperson, Charlotte Osei, has withdrawn his counter suit against her (Charlotte).
Maxwell Opoku Agyemang, through his lawyer, Julius Opoku Agyei, had filed an application in court to challenge the legitimacy of Lawyer Thaddeus Sory to represent both the EC and Mrs Osei as an individual.
This is because Mr. Sory’s Sory@Law firm was part of the petition seeking the impeachment of the EC boss and therefore, the firm must not represent the EC boss in the defamation case against him (Opoku-Agyemang).
Mr Opoku-Agyemang was dragged to court by the EC boss for defamation and professional misconduct.
In her suit Mrs. Osei prayed the court to direct Mr Opoku-Agyemang to “publish a retraction and an apology with the same prominence as the defamatory statements against her and following up to defend those words in the traditional and social media.”
But Mr. Agyemang filed a counter suit in which he prayed the court to throw out the EC chairperson’s case against him.
But in court yesterday, counsel for Mr. Opoku-Agyemang, Julius Opoku Adjei, withdrew the counter suit.
This, according to him, was because his client had instructed another lawyer to make an appearance in the same defamation case in another court.
Mr Thaddeus Sory, lawyer for the EC boss who was clearly not happy with how things unfolded, requested that an amount of GH¢50,000 be awarded as cost to him.
The court, presided over by Justice Ackaah-Boafo, in his ruling granted the application seeking withdrawal and awarded GH¢4,000 as cost to Mr Sory.
Background
Mrs Charlotte Osei hauled Mr Maxwell Opoku-Agyemang for libel.
She is seeking damages from the court against Maxwell Opoku Agyemang, who on behalf of some unnamed workers of the commission, petitioned President Nana Akufo-Addo to remove her as chairperson over stated misconduct.
It may be recalled that some employees in a statement alleged that Mrs. Osei should be impeached for among other alleged offences, bringing the “commission’s name into disrepute by single-handedly petitioning EOCO on an alleged misappropriation of staff endowment fund for malicious reasons.”
They further revealed that following her appointment as EC chair, Mrs. Osei compromised the independence and neutrality of the commission by arranging for a 2015 V8 Land Cruiser with registration number WR 2291-15 from the office of former President John Mahama for use as official vehicle without going through the procurement process or recourse to the commission.
By Gibril Abdul Razak