Former President John Dramani Mahama has expressed anger over the Supreme Court’s delay in scheduling a hearing for an injunction application filed by the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and four other political parties against the Electoral Commission (EC) on the limited voter registration.
Five political parties filed the suit on September 7, challenging the EC’s decision to restrict the upcoming voter registration exercise to its district offices. They argue that the decision will disenfranchise many eligible voters, especially those who live in remote areas.
The Supreme Court was expected to have scheduled a hearing for the application within a few days of its filing, but it is yet to do so.
The five parties are the NDC, the Convention People’s Party (CPP), the All People’s Congress, the Liberal Party of Ghana and the Great Consolidated Popular Party.
The court was expected to have given a date for the application, but it’s yet to do so.
“Contrary to the time-honoured practice of the Registrar of the Supreme Court giving dates for applications to be moved, the Registrar has, as of this afternoon, refused to provide a date for the application for interlocutory injunction filed against the Electoral Commission (EC) in relation to the Commission’s decision to limit the upcoming voter registration exercise to its district offices only.
The writ and the injunction application were duly filed at the Registry of the Supreme Court on Thursday, 7th September 2023, at 2:50 p.m.
The Registrar informed the applicants’ representatives that they were awaiting the date to be given by the Chief Justice, who was outside the jurisdiction at the time. The Chief Justice returned and travelled to Cape Coast for the Bar Conference. As I write, the applicants’ representatives are still waiting at the registry of the Supreme Court.
This is unprecedented and does not augur well for public confidence in the justice delivery system.
In 2012, when a Ghanaian citizen decided to challenge the creation of the 45 new constituencies, the Supreme Court had a sole judge to decide the interlocutory injunction application in a timely manner. Indeed, the practice of assigning single justices to hear interlocutory applications for an injunction has happened several times in the cases of Ekwam v. Pianim, Welford Quarcoo v. Attorney General and Ransford France v. Electoral Commission & Attorney General.
The EC starts the lopsided registration exercise tomorrow for which this process is being filed, and yet we all know the famous mantra, “Justice delayed, is justice denied”, Mahama wrote in a Facebook post.
