All eyes are on Your Lordship the Supreme Court judges empanelled to adjudicate the case of electoral fraud brought against the Electoral Commissioner (Dr. Kwadwo Afari-Gyan) and the fate-in-the-balance President of Ghana (John Dramani Mahama). It is not for nothing that the whole world with Ghanaians all over the world inclusive, are watching you. They are observing and reading with eyes wide open, listening with raised and cleaned ears, and smelling with highly sensitive-twitching nose, all the recently unfolding developments with regard to the writ filed in the Supreme Court challenging Election 2012 presidential results and declaration.
You did oblige the petitioners (Nana Akuffo-Addo, Dr. Bawumia and Jake Obtsebi-Lamtey) to release vital evidential information to the defendants (Dr. Kwadwo Afari-Gyan and President John Dramani Mahama). This was when the defendants filed an interrogatory seeking "further details and better particulars" on all the alleged polling stations where irregularities and fraud took place. You also granted the interrogatory filed by the Counsel for Nana Akuffo-Addo to withdraw, amend or replace the earlier petition filed with you.
While you asked the defendants to provide to the plaintiffs detail information on the 241,524 names on the voter register supposedly registered abroad, you denied the plaintiffs their request for copies of the "pink" sheets covering the entire 26,000 polling stations in Ghana. You were right in your judgment. However, your decision was at variance with mine as published in my article titled, "Supreme Court to determine if Nana Akuffo-Addo is Obliged to release further details to John Mahama & Kwadwo Afari-Gyan before……..?". It was published on Ghanaweb.com, Modernghana.com and SpyGhana.com under Feature Articles on Sunday, 27 January 2013 and Friday 25 January 2013 respectively.
The Counsel for Nana Akuffo-Addo and Co. supplied the "further details and better particulars" as requested, to Dr. Afari-Gyan and President Mahama. However, Dr. Afari-Gyan has not been able to fully comply with his side of the obligation. He has not been able to reasonably justify the number (241,524) of Ghanaians registered abroad with or without the intention to fully participate in Election 2012. He was only able to account for 705 that have even been challenged by Dr. Opoku Prempeh, aka Napo, who opines it is 495 or a figure within that region. In a nutshell, he has tried to justify only about 3,000 out of the 241,524 people registered voters abroad. His explanations for the rest sound very discordant in my ears. He is unable to explain that figure away as reasonably as one would expect of an experienced Electoral Commissioner with a PhD degree and Continental Africa reputation.
I hope Your Lordships the Supreme Court Judges are watching, reading and hearing all the developments in relation to the electoral fraud case. I would also wish to convey to the attention of the Supreme Court the incidents that have occurred before, and after Nana Akuffo-Addo and Co. filed the petition challenging Election 2012 declaration of results in favour of President John Dramani Mahama.
The headquarters of the NPP in Accra was raided by unknown policemen who made away with laptops and other vital documents possibly relating to the election 2012. The policemen said they were tipped off about possible stockpiling of weapons and ammunitions in that premises. May I question their bestiality and flimsy excuse assigned to their unlawful but partisan-inclined behaviour? Were the laptops and documents they took away "Weapons of Mass Destruction" (WMD) they made the whole Ghana believed before they secretly sneaked in to raid the office? As America and their allies never found any WMD in Iraq, so did the surely "Yaw Boateng Gyan police" find nothing at the NPP headquarters.
The office of a Counsel (Lawyer Gloria Akuffo) for Nana Akuffo-Addo & Co. was raided and documents stolen. Hardly had her name gone around as a counsel for Nana Akuffo-Addo & Co. when her office was raided. The raiders had probably intended to grab some documents holding evidential information on the alleged election irregularities and fraud.
An electoral commission office within the District headquarters of Asuogyaman in Atimpoku in the Eastern region was raided and a laptop and pen drive (USB stick) supposedly containing 2012 voter registration information stolen.
Four biometric verification machines have been stolen from Amenfi East Constituency's electoral collation centre. Irregularities took place in that constituency with the defeated NPP parliamentary candidate already lodged a complaint with a local court.
Two people have recently been caught attempting to get electoral presiding officers to endorse fifteen unsigned "pink" sheets in Savelugu in the Northern region.
On or about Friday, 22 February 2013, in the Efigya Kwabre South constituency in the Ashanti region, thieves broke into the New Patriotic Party (NPP) office in the area and made away with some pink sheets and other election 2012 related documents.
What are all the incidents numerated above about? What do they tell the judges sitting on the alleged election 2012 malpractices that made it possible for John Dramani Mahama to dubiously emerge victorious?
If the Supreme Court had ordered the defendants to deposit copies of all the pink sheets covering the 26,000 polling stations in Ghana with her, there would not be this spate of thievery and break-ins by unknown persons in search of evidential items and documents to destroy.
Was my White legal team sharing views with me on the ongoing electoral fraud case pending in the Supreme Court not right to suggest as made known in my article published on 27 January 2013 as indicated above?
I hope the Supreme Court judges are watching and making informed decisions. No, they do not make decisions influenced by outside information or public opinion but on available hard evidence. What about if the police prove that untoward occurrences intended to obliterate incriminating evidences have taken place? They will have to prove that the perpetrators of these crimes were on mission to destroy evidences. They will have to prove who ordered them to commit the crimes and for what reasons.
Can these not be the basis for factoring in circumstantial evidence during their decision making process? Oh, what an insurmountable hurdle to overcome. This would not occur if the Supreme Court had done as I wrote in my quoted article but not as erroneously requested by the plaintiffs. The Court should have obliged Dr. Afari-Gyan to deposit copies of the pink sheets covering all the polling stations relating to election 2012 with her.
I believe the judges have a solution to this enigma that is doing my head in. They must be seen to do JUSTICE to Mother Ghana and Ghanaians. I hope they will not do anything that will tarnish or compromise their reputation. The whole world including my White legal brains are watching and making their own informed decisions.
Rockson Adofo
