Akufo-Addo Tells Supreme Court Media Is Witness To Presidential Win

President Akufo-Addo says the Ghanaian media can testify to the fact that he fairly won the 2020 Presidential election which is now under contention after his main opponent, former President John Mahama, went to court.

In a 12-page response to Mr. Mahama’s case, President Akufo Addo’s lawyers wrote that his victory is “corroborated by all media houses of note in the country as well as many local and international observers”.

It is not clear if the President intends to call witnesses from Ghanaian media houses which have been exposed as having sourced figures that they declared in favor of Akufo-Addo from the President’s campaign team, rather than independent sources.

Several of the said media houses have since retracted their projection during the election reportage between December 7 and December 9, 2020.

Media General’s TV3, Multimedia, Despite Media, Metro TV, among others have been exposed for using mysterious figures syndicated from the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) to make their projections.

Further confusion in the well-coordinated election narrative inspired by the NPP was made evident when the Electoral Commission (EC) changed its own declared results seven times, leaving media houses which had declared the same figures in the dust.

Meanwhile, President Akufo-Addo’s claim that his victory at the polls can be attested to by international observers has already been denied by the observers who have reported that voting went on smoothly but collation was not transparent.

The National Democratic Congress (NDC)’s John Mahama is in court on account of what is seen as a dubious declaration of Akufo-Addo as winner by Jean Mensah from a dubious collation of results.

Mr. Akufo-Addo has asked the Supreme Court to dismiss Mahama’s petition on grounds that it lacks substance. According to him, it is not based on Article 64(1) of the Constitution which makes “the validity” of an election the basis of a Presidential Election Petition.

The Jean Mensa-led EC had on December 9, 2020, given President Akufo-Addo some 51.6% of the votes as against John Mahama’s 47% of the votes. The EC would later however change the figures when it realized that the numbers allotted to the various candidates added up to 103%. Eventually, the EC changed its own declared results seven times to jostle the numbers to fit its declaration.

The EC dubiously rationalized this number-cooking, saying it will not “materially changed” the election result. Ex-President Mahama is contesting this claim as one of the highlights of his election petition.

President Akufo-Addo is being represented by his own law firm, Akufo-Addo, Prempeh and Co. who argues that the petition filed by John Mahama does not disclose any attack on the validity of the elections held in the 38,622 polling stations and the 311 special voting centres.

President Akufo Addo’s response also adds that the allegation of “vote padding” involving some 6622 votes is empty and does not materially affect the outcome of the 2020 general election.

Akufo Addo’s response jabbed Mahama, saying his petition was borne out of the a figment of his [Mahama’s] imagination and that it “is merely conjectural and borne out of petitioner’s unfounded imagination and further that the material facts in the petition do not support the reliefs sought and, therefore, the same should be dismissed in limine as incompetent.”

Akufo-Addo adds that the evidence of vote padding produced by John Mahama amounts to just 6622 votes, which are insignificant since he was validly elected based on Article 64(1) by a margin of 500,000 votes.

The President asks the Supreme Court to, “determine that the petition is incompetent, frivolous and vexatious, and discloses no reasonable cause of action in terms of article 64(1) of the Constitution and set the issue down for legal arguments.”

Judgment is expected by 10 February according to the rules governing the case.