President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has described the Petition filed by the defeated National Democratic Congress (NDC) flagbearer, John Mahama, seeking a re-run of the presidential polls, as incompetent, frivolous and vexatious.
He said the Petition disclosed no reasonable cause of action, and did not meet the threshold for invoking the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court.
Former President John Mahama on December 30, 2020 filed a petition at the Supreme Court seeking an annulment of the Presidential election results and a re-run of the election between him and President Akufo-Addo.
On January 9, 2021, the President also filed his response on the election petition at the Supreme Court.
The President, who is the Second Respondent, in his 12-page response, denied each and every allegation of material fact contained in the Petition.
President Akufo-Addo in his general answer to the Petition said that same was incompetent, devoid of substance and did not measure up to the legal criteria for an action invoking the Court’s jurisdiction under article 64(1) of the Constitution.
The President said upon the declaration of results, copies were posted at the various polling stations in accordance with the law governing the elections.
The Second Respondent said the Petition did not disclose any attack on the validity of the election held throughout the 38,622 polling stations and 311 special voting centres, or any of the processes set out in the paragraphs 3 and 4 (supra).
He said in point of fact, Petitioner only devoted an overwhelming portion of the Petition (30 out of 35 paragraphs) to weak and inconsistent complaints about the “declaration of the winner” of the election by Election Commission (First Respondent), and the remaining five paragraphs to empty allegations of “wrong aggregation of votes” and “vote padding,” which collectively involve about 6.622 votes an amount patently insignificant to materially affect the outcome of an election in which Second Respondent defeated Petitioner by well over 500,000 votes.