The Presidential candidate of the National Democratic Congress(NDC), John Dramani Mahama has petitioned the Supreme Court over the results of the 2020 Presidential election which according to the Electoral Commission was won by Nana Akufo-Addo.
The former President in his petition is urging the Supreme Court to annul the results of the December polls as none of the candidates who contested the election got the required 50 percent plus one of the total votes cast.
Mr. Mahama is also asking the Apex Court for an order of injunction restraining Nana Akufo-Addo holding himself out as President-elect.
Again, the former President wants the court to order the Electoral Commission to organize a second election with himself and Nana Akufo-Addo as the only two candidates.
Mr. Mahama through his lawyer, Tony Lithur argues that the EC Chairperson, Jean Mensa announced the total valid votes cast as 13,434,574, minus the results of Techiman South, with President Akufo-Addo obtaining 6,730,413 of the votes representing 51.595 per cent of the votes while he (Mahama) got 6,214,889 representing 47.366 per cent of the votes.
It is his case that per the figures announced by the EC that the actual percentage for President Akufo-Addo minus that of Techiman South ought to be 50.098 per cent and not 51.595 per cent while his (Mahama’s) percentage minus Techiman South should be 46.26 per cent and not 47.366 per cent.
He argued that the Techiman South Constituency has a total voting population of 128,018 and if that is added to the total valid votes cast as declared by the EC it will be 13,434,574 plus 128,018 (13,562,592).
This according to Mr. Mahama was erroneous for the EC to state that even if all the votes in Techiman South were added to his votes it wound not change the results.
“Consequently, if all the votes of Techiman South Constituency were added to the Petitioner (Mahama)’s votes , the 2nd respondent’s (President Akufo-Addo) votes will remain the same at 6,730,413, now yielding 49.625 per cent , while the votes of the petitioner would increase to 6,342,907, now yielding 46.768 per cent.
“Therefore Mrs Jean Adukwei Mensa’s claim in the purported declaration that adding all the 128,018 votes in Techiman South Constituency of the votes standing to the name of the petitioner would not change the results, was clearly wrong,” Mr Mahama argued.
The petition is asking the Supreme Court to declare that the “purported declaration made on 9 December of the results of the Presidential Election by Mrs Jean Adukwei Mensa is unconstitutional, null and void and of no effect.”
BY Gibril Abdul Razak