Lawyers for the 1st Respondent, Dr Kabiru Mahama, have concluded the cross-examination of the first witness for the petitioner in the ongoing Walewale New Patriotic Party Parliamentary petition case before the Tamale High Court.

This follows the challenge of the election results by the incumbent Member of Parliament, Lariba Zuweira Abudu, who is also the current Gender Minister.

In court, Samson Lardy Anyenini, counsel for the respondent, aimed to establish whether Wuni Yidana, the 1st witness for the petitioner and Secretary of the NPP for Walewale, had been part of the petitioner’s campaign team and had interacted with delegates before, during, and after the elections.

Mr Anyenini further sought to demonstrate that the witness had engaged one of the alleged impersonators who supposedly voted in the primaries, citing specific dates for these alleged interactions.

The witness, however, denied ever engaging with such a person.

Despite this, Counsel for the defense argued that the witness was not being truthful to the court on the key issues he was called to testify about. He added that the witness had allegedly threatened the said impersonator to avoid appearing before the court to testify truthfully. The witness remained firm in his denial of any knowledge of the person in question.

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Mr Anyenini asserted that the real reason the petitioner was threatening the alleged impersonator was that the petitioner had procured this person to vote, with the witness playing an instrumental role, even though the person was not a legitimate delegate.

At this point, counsel for the respondent revisited a pending issue from the court’s session on 19 August 2024. The issue concerned Exhibit C, a series of letters the witness had allegedly received via WhatsApp.

During the 19 August session, the witness informed the court that he did not have the exhibit readily available but would check and present it at the next sitting.

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These purported WhatsApp messages were said to be letters from absentee delegates who claimed that impersonators had voted in their place.

However, the witness failed to produce the WhatsApp messages and letters. Wuni Yidana explained that the phone containing the messages had been given to his daughter, who had formatted it when it developed a fault, resulting in the loss of the information.

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Mr Anyenini, however, accused the witness of dishonesty, arguing that the letters were fabricated to support the petitioner’s case. He also pointed out that formatting a phone does not erase WhatsApp messages.

The second witness for the petitioner, Tahiru Braimah, then took the box. He introduced himself as the polling agent for the petitioner during the primaries. When asked about the assertions made by the Constituency Secretary, Wuni Yidana, regarding his competence, given that he had been elected three times as secretary, the 2nd witness responded that he could not question Yidana's competence, acknowledging that he had won three elections and therefore did not doubt his abilities.

The respondent's lawyer further inquired whether Tahiru Braimah believed that the 1st witness's competence was reflected in the conduct of the elections.