The National Communications Officer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Sammy Gyamfi, has revealed that the Electoral Commission’s response to the party has allowed palpable bias to cloud its judgement.
According to him, the EC’s defence of the eligibility of one Charles Opoku to contest in the upcoming Assin North by-election reeks of bias and has impeded its judgement and interpretation of CI 127 as contained in the EC’s document. He indicated that the EC’s claims in its statement on Tuesday, June 6 are “defective in logic and betrays the Commission’s appreciation of their own criteria and elementary English language”.
Mr Gyamfi stated that the EC’s statement of the CI 127, based on which it indicated that the provision “only requires those nominating a candidate for a parliamentary election in a Constituency to be registered voters in the same Constituency, and not the candidate who is being nominated to contest”, is a deliberate misinterpretation of the document.
“It should be obvious to any educated mind, that the phrase “of the same Constituency” contained at Part 1 of the EC’s own nomination form for the Assin North by-election, refers to the Candidate who is being nominated (proposed, seconded and endorsed) and not the nominees. It is pathetic that the Jean Mensah-led Electoral Commission has allowed their palpable bias to cloud their judgement and interpretation of this simple provision contained in their own document.”
Sammy Gyamfi
Mr Gyamfi noted that anyone who has a basic understanding of English language must appreciate the fact that, the phrase: “of the same constituency”, refers to the Candidate being nominated. With this, he explained that the provision requires persons nominating a Parliamentary Candidate to be “of the same constituency” as the Candidate.
“The inability and/or refusal of the Jean Mensah-led EC to correctly interpret this simple criteria set by themselves, shows how depraved our once-revered Electoral Commission has become, and the extreme lengths they are prepared to go, to manipulate the electoral process for the ruling NPP.”
Sammy Gyamfi
Commenting on the Kumawu citation, the NDC communications officer indicated that the attempt by the Electoral Commission to equalize and rationalize its illegal conduct by citing similar instances in previous elections is “hogwash” to say the least. He emphasized that it is trite that “estoppel” cannot negate illegality.
“A multitude of illegalities cannot constitute legality. The fact that the EC failed and/or neglected to do the right thing in times past does not mean they should be allowed to perpetuate such wrongs.”
Sammy Gyamfi
Furthermore, Mr Gyamfi warned that the NDC will resist any attempt by the EC, acting in cahoots with the New Patriotic Party (NPP) to smuggle the name of Parliamentary Candidate aspirant Charles Opoku into the Assin North by-elections, scheduled for Tuesday, June 27. He insisted that the good people of Assin North deserve to know that the said aspirant is not a voter in the Assin North Constituency.
Ghanaians urged to ignore baseless accusation by NDC
The Electoral Commission in its statement requested Ghanaians to ignore the ‘baseless and unfounded’ allegations of Sammy Gyamfi, concerning the upcoming Assin North by-election.
The Electoral Commission clarified that the qualification criteria for parliamentary candidates are outlined in Article 94 of the 1992 Constitution which states that a person must be a registered voter, at least 21 years of age, and either hail from or reside in the constituency for a total of five years within the last ten years preceding the election.
Reacting to a previous claim by the National Communications Officer of NDC, which stated that EC just relies only on the 1992 constitution to determine who qualifies to be a parliamentary candidate, the Commission dismissed Mr Gyamfi’s claim that the EC should also consider the provisions of CI 127, particularly the Nomination Form, in determining the eligibility of a parliamentary candidate.
The EC emphasized that the fact still remains that the allegation by Sammy Gyamfi to the effect that the EC is working with the NPP to sneak an unregistered voter into the Assin North register is false and called on Sammy Gyamfi to prove it. It stated that over the years, Sammy Gyamfi and his party have put out false claims aimed at maligning the integrity of the EC.
This, the EC explained, was evident in their petition to the Supreme Court after the 2020 Elections alleging that they had won the Elections. It is well known that they could not provide evidence in Court to support their allegations.
Ghana’s democracy, the EC revealed, has come of age and as such called on Sammy Gyamfi to exercise maturity, decorum, and truth in his discussions on the EC.
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