President Mahama Forcefully Hits Home The Point

By Nana Akua Tweneboah-Koduah

Finally, President John Dramani Mahama got his turn and he did not disappoint millions of his supporters when he forcefully told Ghanaians that he won the 2012 Presidential election decisively, squarely, cleanly and fairly. There has been so much nonsense going round from the NPP camp that President Mahama did not win the election fairly and that he got the nod through the “invisible hands” of the Electoral Commission (EC).

Therefore, President Mahama’s comments at the 21st anniversary celebrations of the NDC at the party headquarters in Accra on Monday June 10 was very timely and well executed.

The NPP which could not and still cannot understand why President Mahama took only three months to campaign and won the 2012 Presidential election “one touch” have petitioned the Supreme Court to toss more than 4 million valid votes, which they claim are tainted, so that Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, the defeated candidate who is currently in the UK for medical issues, can be declared the president.

But the court case which started with multiple accusations from the NPP quarters has taken a new dimension as the NPP continues to run away from their own “impeccable water-tight evidence”. We have seen them changing their charge sheet anytime holes are punched into one of their evidences. Therefore, the NPP today have spewed out multiple charges, but no one knows which ones they are still holding on to in court.

It may interest readers to note that today the NPP has disowned the STL allegation which they jumped on and even filed in their affidavit, following the bogus lies by a deputy Communications Director of the party, Sammy Awuku that STL, an Israeli company located at Dzorwulu, was transmogrifying the election results to aid the NDC and President Mahama to win.

The stupid explanation assigned to the sudden abandonment of this allegation which would have spilled innocent blood had it not been the timely intervention of the military and police who stormed the offices of the STL, was that they are dropping that charge from their litany of accusations due to lack of evidence.

Again, the NPP made some wild claims that the election results were padded to favour President Mahama and that votes were deducted from Nana Akufo-Addo’s overall votes. But when these allegations were probed by the respondents, the petitioners took to their heels leaving a huge puff of smoke behind them. The simply impression the NPP gave was that they were no longer interested in pursuing those allegations.

The NPP further piled on their allegations by claiming that the Electoral Commission established 30 “ghost polling stations” to aid the NDC. Later they came back saying they have reduced the number to 23 and finally settled on 22. Why the NPP kept changing the numbers only they can tell. In their claim, they stated that they know nothing about the whereabouts of those polling stations.

But when the respondents proved to the NPP by providing letters which the petitioners have given to their polling agents to report to those “ghost polling stations” and the signatures on some of the pink sheets from the supposed “ghost polling stations”, the NPP backpedalled on that claim.

Another claim which the NPP has suddenly smuggled into their reclassified file after they were exposed by the respondents is the cancelled results in some 7 polling stations in the Northern, Brong Ahafo and the Eastern Regions. The NPP made a huge noise about this claim, but when the Electoral Commissioner, Dr Afari Gyan, mounted the witness box, he told the whole world that all those 7 polling stations in which the results were cancelled due some infractions were won by President Mahama.

And what hurt the NPP the most was when Dr Afari Gyan added that had those results in those 7 polling stations not been cancelled, President Mahama’s overall voter tab would have gone up while that of Nana Akufo-Addo would have gone down.

We next go to charge sheet of the NPP and what we see concerns polling agents. According to the NPP, thousands of polling agents failed to sign the pink sheets which demonstrate the fact that there were irregularities in those polling stations. But the EC has forcefully claimed that those assertions by the NPP were false and that indeed 99% of all the pink sheets were signed by polling agents from all the political parties that contested the elections.

Where do we land next? Our next flight takes us to the signatures of the presiding officers. The NPP alleges that thousands of presiding officers did not append their signatures; therefore, results in every single polling station that the returning officers did not sign must be thrown away. The EC and the other respondents think otherwise. According to them the guidelines for the conduct of the 2012 elections has it that if polling agents appended their signatures on the pink sheets and for some reason the presiding officers forgot to do likewise, the results in those polling stations were still valid.

Dr Mahamadu Bawumia, the star witness of the petitioners was forced to read portions on this issue 5 times in court but the NPP is still not relenting on this. But Dr Afari Gyan even made matters worse for the NPP by claiming that more than 97% of the presiding officers signed the pink sheets and that even if the results in those 3% areas where they did not sign are thrown away, it will still not change the results in favour of Nana Akufo-Addo.

In the midst of all these evidence that have emerged in court, it was therefore, very necessary and important for President Mahama to inform Ghanaians that he indeed won the election but was not aided by anybody.

His assertion will go a long way in allaying the fears of some people that he has something to hide and that he did not in fact win the elections. The NPP simply fear the truth which is currently hurting them badly.

And with the bogus and unscientific cross-examination approach by the NPP lead counsel, Mr Philip Addison, which has hugely exposed them in court, the writing is now clear on the wall: that things are not looking too good for the NPP.

nakuakoduah@yahoo.com