The Electoral Commission of Ghana has been fined GH¢4000 by the Wenchi High Court.

This comes after the Court refused to grant the EC’s request for a stay of proceedings in the ongoing Techiman South election dispute, Friday, July 30.

The EC’s application for a stay of proceedings was to enable it to file a motion to challenge the ruling of the Court at its previous sitting, when it granted the petitioner a motion to amend the title of the writ.

The Counsel for the EC, Emmanuel Addae said the stay of proceedings was to enable him to file supplementary statements in support of the application filed by the National Democratic Congress (NDC) candidate, Mr Christopher Beyere Baasongti.

However, reacting to the EC’s stay of proceedings, the Counsel for the petitioner, Justin Teriwajah argued that the motion was frivolous and unnecessarily geared towards delaying the adjudication of the case.

The High Court, during its previous sitting had granted Christopher Baasongti’s request to make corrections to the figures in his petition from Martin Korsah – 50,013, Chris Beyere – 50,306, to Martin Korsah – 50,118, Chris Beyere – 50,376.

The court despite granting him the request to amend figures in his filed motion, also fined the petitioner for inconveniencing the respondent, who is the MP for Techiman South, Martin Adjei-Mensah Korsah.

Meanwhile, the Court has adjourned proceedings to October 14.

Background

The NDC Parliamentary candidate for Techiman South is asking the Wenchi High Court to declare that the gazetting of Martin Adjei Mensah Korsah as the winner of the 2020 Parliamentary polls for the constituency, is null and void.

The verdict by the Electoral Commission (EC) in the Techiman South Constituency stated that the NPP’s candidate won with 49,682 votes representing 50.2 percent of the total valid votes cast, whilst the NDC’s candidate had 49,205 votes representing 49.8 percent of the total valid votes cast.

But the NDC Parliamentary candidate insists that the figures are not a true reflection of the votes.

According to him, per the pink sheets of the NDC agents at each of the 267 polling stations, he garnered 50,306 votes in the Parliamentary election whilst the 1st Respondent polled 50,013 votes.