Court dismisses Sene West case, fines NPP 14,000 cedis for wasting time
The High Court of Wenchi today dismissed the case of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) on 17 December 2020 to have the results of Sene West annulled.
The court fined 14,000 GHC NPP for wasting its time.
The court also ordered the Electoral Commission to continue the process and to declare the winner of the seat.
There is chaos, however because the NPP says they are ready to open and count the ballot box for the Tato Battor Polling Station B, but the NDC says they are not ready.
The NDC maintains that the court was not specific as to whether the ballots should be counted and that they would not be allowed because the said ballot box had been tampered with.
This has led to a bit of chaos, but armed policemen are in Techiman Police Headquarters to ease the situation.
The Sene West Constituency's Tato Battler Polling Station B ballot box is still to be counted after one Christian Nukpeta snatched the ballot box when the election results were counted.
Although Christian Nukpeta was immediately arrested, the parties concerned noted that the seal of the ballot box belonging to the NPP had been removed, leaving that of the Electoral Commission and the NDC.
As a result, the NPP's Lawyers for Sene West parliamentary candidate, Joseph Markay Kuma, immediately sought an injunction from the court to stop the EC from counting the ballot papers in the box.
Later, Joseph Markay Kuma's lawyers withdrew their motion for an injunction on the declaration of results as filed in their petition.
The ballot box was then locked up in the headquarters of the Techiman Police.
The Electoral Commission issued a statement on the number of parliamentary seats secured by the two main political parties in the just-completed general election.
According to the statement, the NPP won 137 parliamentary seats out of a total of 275, the NDC 136 and the Independent Candidate Lawyer Andrew Asiamah Asamoah 1 seat. This brings the total number of seats declared thus far to 274.
The only outstanding seat to be declared by the EC is that of the Sene West in the Bono East region.
The NDC secured its highest number of seats in the Greater Accra Region by winning 20 seats, while the NPP's stronghold, the Ashanti Region, gave the party 42 seats.
At least 108 of the 275 Members of the 7th Parliament will not return to the 8th Parliament either because they have lost the primaries in their parties or because they have withdrawn or have lost their seats in the elections of 7 December.
That means that some 39.20 per cent of all 275 Members of Parliament will not return to the House.
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