Some members of the Minority in Parliament yesterday [Friday] kicked against the approval of Nkwanta North MP, John Bless Oti’s nomination as Deputy Minister for Local Government.
According to the Minority Spokesperson on Constitutional, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs, Joe Osei-Owusu, the nominee allegedly formed part of the panel that made the contemptuous statements against justices of the Supreme Court on Accra-based Montie FM.
They claim the nominee specifically attacked the integrity of Chief Justice on the said programme.
During that particular radio discussion, two panelists, Alister Nelson and Godwin Ako Gunn, together with the host of the ‘Pampaso’ political show, Maase Salifu, a.k.a Mugabe, threatened to eliminate justices of the Supreme Court over their handling of the lawsuit on the credibility of the country’s voters’ register.
The other three have since been jailed for four months, and paid a fine of Ghc 10,000 each, after the court found them guilty of contempt charges brought against them.
Citifmonline.com is in possession of the audio recording of the show, to ascertain the veracity of the claims made by the minority.
In the audio, Oti Bless began by accusing the Chief Justice of ‘conniving’ with the opposition NPP in an attempt to reverse the election results in 2008 and in 2012 which saw the late John Evans Atta Mills and John Dramani Mahama elected into office respectively,
“It is time for us to sit up and point out certain things and expose things to open people’s eyes so that they see what’s going on. We need to talk about what the Chief Justice did in 2008, when she almost got the election result – the one won by Atta Mills genuinely, reversed. Because of God’s blessing and love for Prof. Mills and Ghana, this did not happen. In 2012, when President Mahama won the election genuinely, which everyone can attest to, NPP, in connivance with this woman [Chief Justice] – they brought her into office. If it weren’t for God, we’d be sitting on a time bomb in Ghana. We – the Parliamentary select committee consisting of five MPs travelled out of the country to the US. We were in Georgia chatting with a US Senator who was talking about our election petition. From how they were talking, it was obvious we were a serious joke in this country. Any child, even one who hasn’t gone to school before would have seen that there was no case, it was ‘419’, and educated judges who, instead of thinking of the country’s future, rule in favour of these dirty, useless and empty issues. It’s very sad. Since then my spirit as a Ghanaian…as many as four judges ruled in favour of this so-called petition.
Oti Bless then suggested that the Chief Justice and the justices working under her had adopted a biased stance against the governing party, and had ruled in favour of the NPP in matters that involved the opposition’s top officials.
Because of NPP partisanship, the Chief Justice intentionally empaneled the judges in a way that would favour them. Any issue that affects top NPP officials which is clearly fraudulent, the Chief Justice will empanel the judges in a way to favour them. The bungalow Jake Obetsebi bought, would anyone sell their building for the peanuts he bought it for? There were former NPP officials and ministers who bought government land in prime areas for 2, 000 cedis and 3, 000 cedis which would be sold to anyone else for millions of cedis or dollars. When the matter was taken to court, the judges ruled in favour of Jake Obetsebi Lamptey. If he had sold the house or left it to the state, maybe God would have saved him. We have a Chief Justice who because of political favours, always favours the NPP.
The MP then went on to accuse the NPP and the Chief Justice of meddling in the activities of the Chief Justice, alleging that a plot had been hatched in 2012 to kidnap the daughter of the lead counsel for President Mahama in the 2012 election.
The Electoral Commission is an independent body. Why are the NPP meddling in the affairs of the Electoral Commission. We have a whole Chief Justice – a woman of her stature and age – with children who is playing politics and trying to force the EC’s hand to stop elections, are you not calling for civil war in the country? The Supreme Court which is supposed to be the last resort for people seeking justice. We have to keep an eye on the Chief Justice. In the court, there is a worker at the Supreme Court who don’t see eye-to-eye because of partisan politics. In the 2012 elections, there was a plot to use a driver to kidnap the child of Tony Lithur, who was the lead counsel for the President so that it would take his attention from the issue.
-citifmonline