Konadu files fresh suit

Lawyers for former First Lady Nana Konadu Agyeman-Rawlings have filed a fresh suit against the Electoral Commission praying the court to reinstate the flag bearer of the National Democratic Party (NDP) in the presidential election.

The new suit filed on Thursday, 27 October comes on the back of the dismissal of an earlier suit by an Accra Circuit Court on the same day.
Earlier, in his ruling, Justice George K. Koomson said the decision was due to a wrong procedure used by Nana Konadu hence making the case “incompetent.”

He said the applicants were wrong in including an application for judicial review and the enforcement of fundamental human rights in one writ.

The NDP applied for an interlocutory injunction to be placed on all processes in connection with the elections, which would require their participation.

Nana Konadu and her NDP were also praying the court to declare as illegal the deadline the EC set for receiving nominations and “a further declaration that the EC erred in law when it decided not to accept the applicants nomination thereby wrongfully and illegal disqualifying the applicants from contesting in the 2016 presidential elections.”

They are also seeking an order quashing the EC’s decision not to accept Konadu’s nominations and an order compelling the EC to accept her nomination and to include her name on the ballot for the 2016 presidential election.

Nana Konadu was disqualified with 12 other presidential nominees because they failed to meet the necessary requirements of the electoral laws.
In explaining the NDP’s disqualification, the EC Chair said:

“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).”