Former President John Dramani Mahama has filed a motion to stay proceedings of the Supreme Court to enable a determination of an application for a review of the decision of the court on January 19, 2021.
The fresh application filed yesterday is seeking that the Supreme Court revisits its decision that dismissed the petitioner of 2020 presidential election, Mr Mahama’s motion to serve interrogatories on the Electoral Commission (EC).
In the said application, Mr Mahama is urging the court that he has filed for review based on certain fundamental errors of law that the court committed in its ruling, hence led to miscarriage of justice.
“At the hearing of this application, Counsel will crave the indulgence of the court to refer to the statement of case in support of the application for review, particularly, to show that there are, indeed, serious matters of law that are to be determined in this review application, and I am likely to succeed, as the ruling of the court is manifestly in error,” he lamented.
It was also the petitioner’s case that although he had strong conviction that the interrogatories would ensure a speedily trial, the court has given certain orders, including that he, together with his witnesses, should file their witness statements and exhibits by midday yesterday for the hearing of the petition, from Tuesday, January 26.
Per advice by his counsel, Mr Tsatsu Tsikata, discovery processes such as interrogatories are normal pre-trail processes to limit the scope of a trial, and the review application will seek to recognise the right to have recourse to them.
“The denial to us of leave to serve interrogatories is a serious miscarriage of justice, which we expect to have remedied in the review,” he said. “For the hearing of the petition to proceed before the review is heard would cause irreparable harm to the conduct of our case, since I would have been denied the benefit of normal pre-trial processes.”
He went on to say his counsel had also served a request to admit facts on the EC (1st Respondent) and has not yet received a response to that, meanwhile, the request is necessary for the finalisation of their witness statement, yet they have been ordered to file witness statements.
On this score, Mr Mahama adds: “All the above constitute exceptional circumstances on the basis of which we respectively seek orders of the court staying the proceedings in this case until the determination of the application for review.”
He stressed that the court not staying proceedings would create the unfortunate impression that the review application had been pre-determined and no prejudice would be caused to the respondents by the grant of such leave.
The post Your ruling is a miscarriage of justice -Mahama appeared first on The Chronicle Online.
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