A Koforidua High Court, presided over by Justice Suurebareh on Friday ruled that the writ filed by the National Democratic Congress (NDC) candidate, Babal Jamal, contesting the 2008 elections was competent and not improper as being contested by the New Patriotic Party (NPP) candidate, Dr Kofi Asare. He therefore dismissed the application filed by Dr Kofi Asare’s legal counsel and awarded a cost of GH¢500 for the plaintiff. The dismissal of the application meant that the court could now go into the substantive case filed by Baba Jamal and two independent candidates requesting the EC to conduct fresh parliamentary election in the Akwatia constituency. The EC had earlier on wanted to conduct the elections in only six polling stations where elections disputes occurred on December 7. Giving his ruling, Justice Suurebareh upheld that since none of the four candidates had been declared winner and the EC had not gazette any results for the Akwatia parliamentary, the election was not concluded therefore grievances could be filed in the form of writ and not petition. Referring to Article 99 of the constitution, he ruled that election petition could only be filed where an election had taken place and a candidate had been declared winner. He said in that case, the petitioner could challenge the eligibility of the person holding himself as a candidate but in the Akwatia case all those procedures had not been concluded. Justice Suurebareh indicated that, “the EC was a legal entity but subjected to the rule of law and therefore cannot be allowed to execute its legal mandate on grounds of expediency when there were breaches of the law”. Babal Jamal filed a writ at the Koforidua High court to compel the EC to conduct fresh elections in all the 89 polling stations and not the six stations on December 28 alongside the presidential run-off. In pursuant of that, Dr Kofi Asare also filed an application at the court challenging that the case must be pursued in the form of a petition and not a writ contesting that the NDC had a case but needed to appear proper at the court. Source: GNA