Kweku Baako
The Editor-in-Chief of the New Crusading Guide newspaper, Abdul Malik Kweku Baako, has dragged the Attorney-General, Gloria Afua Akuffo, to the Supreme Court over the removal of the chairperson of the Electoral Commission (EC) Charlotte Osei from office.
He avers in the writ that the committee set up by the Chief Justice, Justice Sophia Akuffo, to investigate six allegations leveled against the EC boss and her two deputies, Amadu Sulley and Georgina Opoku-Amankwa, acted in excess of its powers when it recommended the removal of the former EC bosses from office.
According to him, the recommendation of the committee, which occasioned the removal of the three EC officials, is “unconstitutional, and by reason null, void and of no effect.”
The writ is also challenging the decision of the CJ to establish a prima facie case against the EC officials based on the six allegations presented by the petitioners, saying it’s inconsistent with Article 146 (3) of the 1992 Constitution.
He is therefore praying the apex court to declare the recommendation and removal of Mrs. Osei and her two deputies from office as unconstitutional, null, void and of no effect.
Reliefs
The 18 paragraphed writ is seeking among other reliefs a declaration that upon a true and proper construction of Article 146 (1) of the 1992 Constitution, a petition for the removal of the chairperson of the EC, pursuant to the provisions of Article 146, was only valid if such a petition alleged stated misbehaviour or incompetence relating to the performance of the core constitutional functions of the chairperson of the EC.
The writ is seeking a “declaration that in exercising the constitutional functions and duties of a committee constituted by the CJ under Article 146 (4) of the 1992 Constitution, the committee so established exercised an administrative rather than the functions and duties of a judge or judicial officer and that the committee was required to act in accordance with regulations governing the exercise of its discretionary power under Article 146 (4) of the 1992 Constitution.”
The plaintiff is also seeking “a declaration that the finding by the Chief Justice (CJ) that a prima facie case had been made in respect of six allegations contained in the petition for the removal of Mrs Osei pursuant to Article 146 of the Constitution and which allegations were not founded on acts of stated misbehaviour or incompetence against Mrs Osei in the performance of her core functions as chairperson of the EC was unconstitutional, null, void and of no effect.”
Background
The chairperson of the EC and her two deputies were relieved of their duties following the recommendation by a committee set up by the Chief Justice to investigate some serious allegations against the three.
The petition had been brought against Mrs Charlotte Osei by 17 workers of the EC in July last year, and afterwards a counter petition was filed against her two deputies by a non-staff of the commission named Emmanuel Korsi Senyo, aka Emmanuel Korsi Senyo Kumedzina, who is an activist of the opposition NDC and graduate of KNUST.
By Gibril Abdul Razak