President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, the Second Respondent in the Election Petition filed by former President John Dramani Mahama, has served notice of raising a preliminary objection on the Petition.
He said the objection would be based on the grounds upon which the Petition was based and that it did not meet the requirement imposed on a petitioner under article 64 (1) of the 1992 Constitution.
He said the reliefs claimed by the Petitioner, particularly reliefs (b), (c), (d) and (f), which purported to declare as unconstitutional the declaration of the results of the Presidential election by First Respondent (Electoral Commission) and consequently claimed an order for annulment of the Declaration of President-Elect Instrument, 2020 (C 1 135), were not supported by facts pleaded in the Petition.
He said paragraphs 6 through to 30 of the Petition recounted allegations of mathematical errors contained in parts of the declaration made by Chairman of the EC, and that at law, a challenge of the declaration of results of an election did not amount to an attack on the validity of an election.
He said the Petitioner has not in the Petition, challenged the validity of the elections conducted throughout the 38,622 polling stations and 311 special voting centres in the country, and has therefore not challenged the lawfulness of the election.
President Akufo-Addo said even though the Petitioner claimed a relief for “a second election with the Petitioner and Second Respondent as the candidates” he fails to indicate the number of valid votes (or percentage thereof) that he should have obtained in the election as well as the number of votes (or percentage thereof) that Second Respondent should have obtained in the election, to support such a relief.
He also intended to raise an objection that the Petitioner’s allegation of “vote padding”, assuming same to be valid, put in issue a meagre 5662 votes, which could not affect the outcome of the election; and that in the circumstances, the Petition was incompetent, frivolous and vexatious, and disclosed no reasonable cause of action in terms of article 64(1) of the Constitution.
The Second Respondent accordingly invited the Apex Court to determine that the Petition was incompetent, frivolous and vexatious, and disclosed no reasonable cause of action in terms of article 64(1) of the Constitution and set the issue down for legal arguments.
GNA