You’re not the chief examiner here – Rojo Mettle tells EC Lawyer

There were some bizarre exchanges between counsel for the 1st Respondent Electoral Commission, Justin Amenuvor, and 3rd witness for the petitioner, Robert Joseph Mettle-Nunoo (Rojo Mettle) at the Supreme Court during Monday’s hearing of the 2020 Presidential Election Petition.

Rojo Mettle was in the witness box for the 2nd day of his cross-examination, the first day being Friday, January 5 when 5 paragraphs of his 32-paragraphed witness statement was expunged for lacking basis in the petitioner’s pleadings.

While under cross-examination, lawyer for the EC put it to the witness that his witness statement is not a true testimony of what transpired at the EC’s strong room.

Rojo Mettle said everything contained in his witness statement is true and that he swore an oath to speak the truth.

But Lawyer Justin Amenuvor insisted the witness lied. He said the witness did not do a good job for the petitioner whose interest he was to protect while in the strong room.

“Your witness statement and evidence that you have given is a bad explanation for the bad job that you did for the petitioner”, he insisted.

Rojo Mettle said he delivered on his job to the best of his abilities and that he could not be said not to have done a good job.

“You’re being judgmental. I was performing a function and I’m supposed to protect the interest of my candidate, my presidential candidate and I did it based on my knowledge…” he responded.

The lawyer still insisted, arguing the witness failed at his job and had to lie to the petitioner and party faithfuls to cover his shortcomings.

The witness did not seem to take kindly to the lawyer’s insistence and insinuations.

He thus retorted, “that’s not correct, you’re not the chief examiner here”.

The exchanges got heated at a point that the bench had to intervene to call on the witness to respond directly to the questions being asked.