Supreme Court Suspension Of Assin North MP Illogical …Law Professor

Law Professor, Kwaku Asare, has chided the Ghanaian Supreme Court’s majority ruling upholding an injunction on the Member of Parliament for Assin North by a Cape Coast High Court.

According to him, the ruling lacks a foundation in commonsense.

In a zoom interaction with Joy FM’s Evans Mensah, Prof. Asare who is also a Fellow at the Center for Democratic Development (CDD) points out that there has been a strange reversal of roles by the courts, with the High Court taking up the Supreme Court jurisdictional mandate of interpreting the constitution, while the Supreme Court has allowed itself to be directed by the High Court.

“There is a judge somewhere in Cape Coast who has interpreted article 94 (2) (a) and told the Plaintiff, Hey Plaintiff, I’m going to grant you all your reliefs. And the Supreme Court is sitting there saying, well yes, we don’t understand Article 94 (2) (a) and we are going to interpret it but meanwhile, we think it is okay for some High Court judge not only to interpret it but to issue and grant injunctions setting aside the wishes of voters…,” Prof. Asare said.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday gave a 5-2 majority ruling in the case in which a New Patriotic Party (NPP) man called Michael Ankomah Nimfah, was seeking to enforce an injunction that a Cape Coast High Court had placed on Assin North MP, James Gyekye Quayson, from holding himself out as MP.

Despite official evidence from Canada to the contrary, the Ghanaians courts are upholding claims that Hon. Quayson was a Canadian citizen at the time of winning the parliamentary elections.

Mr. Gyekye Quayson had renounced his Canadian citizenship in November 2019, a whole year before he would apply and stand for election as MP.

Professor Asare points out that the Cape Coast High Court judge’s supposed ruling to cancel the Assin North election was unconstitutional, and that the Cape Coast High Court judge, reached his bogus judgment by referring to Wikipedia as a citation for its ruling.

“Here is one thing that people should take into account; at the trial court, the High Court in Cape Coast, there was really no trial; the High Court simply took the arguments of the two parties, went to Wikipedia and copied some phrases from Wikipedia and based on that, ruled that the MP owed allegiance to Canada. And mind you, you have been referring to dual citizenship but Article 94 (2) (a) does not say anything about dual citizenship; it says something about ‘you owe allegiance to a country other than Ghana,” Prof. Asare discredited the Cape Court High Court.

Prof. Asare points out that, Mr. Gyakye Quayson duly renounced his citizenship of Canada, a whole year ahead of the 2020 election in Ghana before contesting to be mp.

In fact, it is on record that these same allegations of he holding dual citizenship came up ahead of the elections and the Electoral Commission (EC) investigated the claim and cleared him.

Meanwhile, former President Mahama has called the ruling by the Supreme Court a travesty of justice.

In a post on Facebook, Mr. Mahama spoke the minds of many Ghanaians when he wondered how an MP could be disallowed from representing his people when the substantive case in which his nationality is being challenged is still yet to be determined.

“I cannot understand how an MP can be restrained from carrying out his duties when the substantive case to give finality to the question of his legitimacy has not been determined,” Mahama observed.

“Or is it the case that the outcome of the substantive case has been predetermined against him? The representation of the people is at the heart of our democracy. Any decision that denies the citizenry of representation is a travesty of justice and an affront to our democracy,” he wrote.