The lawyer for Haruna Apaw Wiredu, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) parliamentary candidate for Fanteakwa North, has filed a motion at the Koforidua High Court seeking to nullify the Electoral Commission’s (EC) re-declaration of the constituency’s election results.
The motion, filed by Isaac M. Larbi, Esq., calls for a Judicial Review in the nature of Certiorari to quash the purported re-declaration of the results, as announced by a deputy returning officer of the EC at Tesano, Accra, on December 12, 2024.
The application also seeks an order of Prohibition to prevent the EC from publishing or gazetting the re-declared results.
Lawyer Larbi argues that the re-declaration was unlawful and exceeded the jurisdiction of the deputy returning officer.
He maintains that only the designated Returning Officer, as prescribed by law, has the authority to declare election results.
“In Ghana, there are only two authorized returning officers: one for parliamentary elections and one for presidential elections. For parliamentary elections, the Returning Officer in the constituency is the only individual empowered to declare the results,” he said.
On December 10, 2024, the official Returning Officer, Zacharia Adams, declared Haruna Apaw Wiredu as the winner of the Fanteakwa North parliamentary election with 11,138 votes against the New Patriotic Party (NPP) candidate, Kwame Appiah Kodua, who polled 10,847 votes.
However, two days later, a deputy returning officer in Tesano, Accra, re-declared Kwame Appiah Kodua as the winner, citing new results: 11,751 votes for the NPP candidate and 11,297 for the NDC candidate. This re-declaration sparked legal action from the NDC.
Lawyer Larbi alleges that the EC’s actions constitute contempt of court, as an injunction and writ of summons had been served to prevent any re-collation or re-declaration of the results.
“Their conduct with this second so-called declaration is already contemptuous. The NPP candidate cannot bypass due process by orchestrating a re-declaration. The proper procedure is to challenge the results in court,” he emphasized.
The legal team for the NDC insists that the original declaration by the official Returning Officer stands unless overturned by a court of competent jurisdiction.
He said as it stands, Haruna Apaw Wiredu remains the MP-elect for Fanteakwa North and is set to be sworn in on January 7, 2025.
