Election Petition: Supreme Court Rejects John Mahama’s Request To Inspect EC’s Documents

The Supreme Court of Ghana has unanimously dismissed an application filed by the petitioner, John Dramani Mahama, the 2020 flagbearer of the National Democratic Congress, in the ongoing Election Petition hearing requesting to inspect documents of the Electoral Commission.

The documents John Mahama filed an application to be inspected included the original constituency presidential election result collation forms for all constituencies, constituency presidential election results summary sheet, regional presidential election summary sheets for all regions, and the declaration of the presidential results form.

During the hearing today, Wednesday, February 3, 2021, the lead lawyer for the petitioner, Mr Tsatsu Tsikata argued that his client was entitled to inspect the documents of the 1st Respondent due to the differences in the number of total valid votes cast and other results in the declared results to enable the petitioner to confirm whether their documents are the same as those in the custody of the 1st Respondent, the Electoral Commission.

However, the application was objected to by lawyers of the respondents who described the application as misconceived because the petitioner has all carbonated copies of the said documents hence such a request was untenable.

They argued that the burden of proof is on the petitioner and that he cannot use the backdoor to adduce evidence from the respondents. In addition, the timing of the application and the failure of the petitioner to produce documents and evidence of his own denies him the right to the application.

The apex court in ruling on the application dismissed same saying the threshold of necessity has not been met by lawyers of John Mahama, the petitioner.