It’s not over – NDP tells EC

The National Democratic Party (NDP) has served notice it “shall continue to fight” until its candidates are given clearance to contest the December 7 elections.

An Accra High Court on Thursday dismissed a suit against the Electoral Commission by the NDP over the disqualification of the party’s flagbearer Nana Konadu Agyeman-Rawlings.

At the last court hearing, lawyers of the EC argued that the NDP's application lacked merit and was not properly before the court.

The court in its ruling, described the NDP’s suit as “incompetent”.

However, in a statement, the Secretary General of the party Mohammed Frimpong, assured the party’s supporters that they will explore all legal means to be part of the race for the Flagstaff House.

“We assure all Ghanaians and our teeming supporters that this matter is not over, not by a long shot,” he stressed. “We shall continue to fight to ensure that persons in public offices respect the Constitution of the land and laws that are passed to protect ordinary citizens from arbitrariness, capriciousness and prejudice, and actions that breach the due process of law and requirements imposed by law.”

The NDP said it “respects” the court’s ruling but “disagrees” with it.

The NDP has therefore “instructed” its lawyers to “immediately file an action to enforce our rights that we believe the Electoral Commission has blatantly violated leading to its decision not to accept our nomination forms and then disqualify our candidates from contesting in the 2016 Presidential Elections.”

The court also fined the applicants GHC10,000.

Nana Konadu was disqualified with 12 other presidential nominees because they failed to meet some requirements of the electoral laws ahead of the December polls.

In explaining the NDP’s disqualification, the EC explained that, “The Commission is unable to accept Mrs. Rawlings’ nomination because the number of subscribers to her forms did not meet the requirements of Regulation 7 (2) (b) of CI 94.

“One subscriber on page 89 of her nomination forms is not a validly registered voter, and illegally registered twice and so is on the Exclusion list of multiple voters.

“Details are Salifu Abdulai District: Nanumba South, Voter ID no: 6617004814 (28.3.2012), Voter ID no: 2126900022 (04.8.2014).”