The New Patriotic Party today held a press conference to outline the reasons behind the petition it filed at the Supreme Court Friday, 28 December, 2012 to contest the outcome of the December 7 and 8 polls. The Chairman of the NPP, Jake Obetsebi Lamptey, who is one of the three plaintiffs of the petition, was first to address the press conference stated that contesting the outcome of a presidential election is not a novelty in Ghana. He stated that the ruling NDC in 2004 also contested the results of the polls which the late John Mills lost to John Agyekum Kufuour, at the Supreme Court. He intimated that they uncovered irregularities that not only favored the NDC presidential candidate, John Mahama but also some NDC parliamentary candidates in various constituencies across the country. He added the party will also gather evidence to contest constituencies that were won by NDC parliamentary candidates. According to Jake, the NPP was able to collate results from ninety percent of the over 26,000 polling stations and was confident the Supreme Court would uphold their case. The other plaintiff of the petition filed at the Supreme Court, Nana Akufo Addo said the sanctity of the ballots must be protected. According to him, Elections are not about those who count the ballots or supervise it, but about the person who casts his vote. He added that the NPP is ready to concede defeat but the party is constrained by what he described as “arithmetic mistakes” that favoured John Dramani Mahama. The NPP presidential Candidate also said the petition they filed at the Supreme Court was to ensure the Electoral Commission render itself accountable to the people of Ghana. According to him the aim of the NPP was not to destabilized the country but ensure the sanctity of the ballots is protected and also to deepen the democratic credentials of the country. The third plaintiff of the petition, vice-presidential candidate, Mahamodu Bawumia revealed that they discovered mild discrepancies at the polling station level in the over 24,000 polling stations they audited. He also revealed that there were “massive and pervasive” irregularities that favoured John Dramni Mahama. According to him, the EC’s clean-up of the voter register rather saw the number of registered voters jump from 14,031,642 to 14,158,890. He also added that the party’s audit of the December 7 outcome also revealed that there were thousands of polling stations that bore the same serial numbers. He described the irregularities as “sophisticated” which though occurred in small quantities at various polling stations which accumulated to form a substantial quantum of votes that is enough to change the outcome of the polls. He also revealed that, contrary to the EC’s stance, “no verification, no vote”, there were many polling stations were voting took place without the voter verification machines. Dr. Bawumia ended the press conference by revealing that the petition they filed at the Supreme Court was to challenge a total of 1,340,018 votes that the party says were declared in favour of John Dramani Mahama.