Throw out 'incompetent' petition against EC Chair – Kofi Adams

The petition seeking to remove Charlotte Osei, the Chair of the Electoral Commission (EC) should be thrown into the bin because it is incompetent, Kofi Adams, National Organiser of the main opposition, National Democratic Congress (NDC), has said.

According to him, if the petition is not thrown out, it will destabilise the focus of Mrs Osei and two of her Deputies, Amadu Sulley (in charge of Operations) and Georgina Amankwa (in charge of corporate service), as far as their core mandates are concerned.

Mrs Osei is expected to answer for six allegations out of the 27 accusations levelled against her by her two deputies.

This was after she appeared before the Chief Justice at the Supreme Court on Monday, December 11, after the President forwarded a petition by Forson Ampofoh and Godsway Dzado, both drivers at the EC office for her impeachment in relation to alleged corruption and mismanagement.

The two deputies are to also answer for their alleged roles in the disappearance of some GHS480,000 from the EC’s Endowment Fund, among other allegations.

Mrs Osei, who was present at the hearing with her lawyer explained that she has not been officially served with the petition. She has therefore written to the presidency to furnish her with a copy of the petition.

Reacting to this development in an interview with Chief Jerry Forson, host of the Ghana Yensom on Accra 100.5FM on Friday, December 15, Mr Adams said: “The woman has supervised an election where, for the first time, a sitting president lost the election. This election was supervised by the same person they are accusing now, so why will you want to remover her from office?

“The petition is incompetent and so it needs to be thrown away so we don’t waste the time of Ghanaians.”

He added: “His Excellency Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has objectives to create regions. The creation of these regions will demand a referendum. We also have local level elections to be conducted before the 2020 general elections.

"The president also wants us to vote to elect DCEs and MCEs and all these works will be supervised by the Electoral Commission. But as we speak, an incompetent person has petitioned the president to remove the EC chair, the President has also forwarded it to the Chief Justice, the Chief Justice has also established a prima facie case and has accordingly invited them to respond.

Now, the three persons, the Chair and her two deputies, will have to spend time responding to the petition, so, there will be no focus on their work at the commission. If care is not taken, all the plans of the president to create new regions, and the elections of the DCEs and MCEs will be affected.”