Trying Times Ahead for John Mahama - Errors of Law

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Parent Category: Justice & Security

Created on Sunday, 05 May 2013 00:00

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Errors of Law

There are three major types of legal rules that are associated with dispute over error of law: (1)Substantive Rules- These authorise the decision-maker to make the primary decision- being the decision that can change the legal position of one or more of the parties; (2) Jurisdictional Rules- These determine the authority of a court, an official or a tribunal to decide a case; (3)Adjectival Rules- these do not directly determine the applicant’s legal position but dictate to the parties and the adjudicator how the dispute is to be heard and are categorized as follows: (a) Pleading- Rules of pleading lay down the manner in which parties must formally state their case for the benefit of the adjudicator and the other parties. (b) Evidence- Rules of evidence lay down what sort of evidence the adjudicator can consider and possibly also in what circumstances and to what effect. At common law there are two sets of rules of evidence- judicial rules for courts and the administrative rules for tribunals and officials. (c) Procedure- Rules determine what is to be done at the hearing and in what order.

Dr Bawumia asserts that having examined some 24,000 pinks sheets, it was discovered that there is a case of many irregularities, over voting, voting without verification, duplication of polling station serial numbers, and pink sheets without signatures of presiding officers. Therefore, the EC’s declaration of John Mahama as winner could not be supported by the primary evidence. “My Lords, it looks like every irregularity, violation and malpractices, is supposed to be an error except the declaration of the results....” According to Dr Bawumia, closer examination revealed that some 535,723 people, allegedly, voted without observing the biometric verification process and that “the EC cannot apply one set of rules to one polling station and a different set of rules to another polling station.” He reiterated that fairness and equity at all polling stations ought to have been evenly applied in 2012 elections. It is contended that pink sheets containing records of voting at some 1039 polling stations and here, with some 705, 305 total votes cast, did not have the signatures of the presiding officers.

With the grounds of judicial review discussed above, we can argue, but with caution that there is indeed, “Trying Times Ahead for John Mahama’s presidency”. Procedurally, Dr Bawumia had told the Supreme Court that the EC had still not fully complied with furnishing the petitioners with particulars of declared presidential results with the said 241,554 voters claimed to have registered abroad. It is also on record that the EC has so far, managed to submit a list covering only 705 voters, including, the “New Yorker Twins”. Dr Bawumia seems to suggest that the EC’s foreign list is not “credible” and that when the petitioners, demanded the bio-data of the foreign voters from the EC, the data they received indicated what he describes to the court as a changing voters’ register, “fake voter ID numbers” and a “mathematical formula” where same names had different numbers running through. Dr Bawumia states the EC provided a total register of 14,301,680 of voters before the election.

But on 9 December 2012 when the EC chairman declared the results of the election, he gave a figure of 14,158,890, a difference of 127,210 from the one they had earlier on provided. Tony Lithur- lead counsel for President John Mahama, not forgetting the other defence counsels, seem to accuse Dr Bawumia of misleading the court- suggesting that he desperately wants to make up the numbers needed to overturn the declared results that favoured his client. Yet the NPP Star Witness insists on ‘Ghost’ Polling Stations, alleging that voting took place at some 22 polling stations which were not among the traditional 26002 polling stations on the EC’s list. In the words of Enright, one of the major common law rules of procedure consists of the rules of natural justice. “These require that a party receive a fair hearing from an unbiased decision maker and that the problem that has beset error of law involves an anachronism in the core sense of that term, namely that the proper time sequence for events was disrupted. “In the popular expression it entails putting the cart before the horse,” he says.

The indications are mixed and unpredictable for John Dramani Mahama, as Afari-Gyan mounts the witness box, to reconcile the balance sheet of the said 241,000 overseas votes which as it stands, might determine John Dramani Mahama’s political future?

Researched and Compiled By Asante Fordjour for The OmanbaPa Research Group

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