Election petition is ‘dramatic shift’ from NDC's initial views about 2020 polls - Anyenini

Private legal practitioner, Samson Lardi Anyenini, has said the National Democratic Congress (NDC), and its flagbearer, John Dramani Mahama, have made a major change in their arguments about the 2020 presidential election results.

According to the respected lawyer, before John Mahama filed the 2020 presidential election petition at the Supreme Court, the leadership of the party was using terms such as “stolen verdict” to describe the outcome of the polls.

However, in the petition, Mr Anyenini observed, the party's presidential candidate is claiming that neither he nor Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo got enough votes to be declared a winner.

“We have heard words like ‘stolen verdict’, we have heard expressions like ‘fictionalised’ and ‘fraud’ those may not sit within the present suit, but when you hear claims that by the NDC’s own computation, [former] President Mahama had secured a win and that he ought to have been declared a winner.

“Then you read the petition and it says President Mahama did not win, Akufo-Addo did not win because neither made nor crossed the threshold of more than 50% of total valid votes, therefore, there ought to be a runoff. That is a dramatic shift from what you see in the court,” he said.

He made the comments during a discussion on Joy News on Wednesday, December 30, 2020.

According to the Electoral Commission, Mr Mahama obtained 47.4% of the total votes cast, while Nana Akufo-Addo got 51.6% of the votes.

Mr Mahama is claiming in the petition that results available to NDC showed that no presidential candidate obtained the 50% plus 1 vote of total valid votes to declare Nana Akufo-Addo the winner.

Mr Mahama wants the results declared by the EC annulled by the apex court and fresh elections held.