NDC punches holes into Supreme Court’s full judgement on Gyakye Quayson
The Director of Legal Affairs of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), has pooh-pooed portions of the Supreme Court’s full judgement which formed the basis for the removal of James Gyakye Quayson’s name from the records of Parliament as the Member of Parliament for Assin North.
The Supreme Court on Monday released the official document detailing why it declared unconstitutional the election of James Gyakye Quayson as MP for Assin North in the Central Region.
Speaking on Joy FM’s Top Story on Monday, Mr Abraham Amaliba described as ‘mind boggling’ the failure of the apex court to particularly address Section 21 D of PNDC Law 284.
He explained that per that law, the court can only nullify the election of a person if he or she was not qualified at the time of an election, and not at the time of filing his or her nomination.
For this reason, he questioned why the Supreme Court determined in the case of Mr Quayson that his qualification is at the time of filing his nomination.
According to him, he expected the apex court to analyze that section of the law and deal with it “and then say that notwithstanding that, we think that the time for qualification is nomination.”
He said the court was not supposed to turn its back on section 21 D of the PNDC Law 284 unless it had a strong reason not to do so.
“In ex parte national lottery, this is what Justice Atuguba said ‘Courts are servants of the legislature and must give effect to the expert provision of the statutes unless there is a strong policy why that should not be done.”
Meanwhile, the NDC minority in parliament has served notice that it will study the full document to determine its line of action, especially regarding the expected approval or otherwise of the Chief Justice nominee, Justice Gertrude Torkornoo, who was questioned on the apex court’s ruling on Gyakye Qyason when she appeared before parliament for vetting.
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