- "It happened with my own friend when he decided to move to Ghana to contest, Adamu Daramani Sakande. What are the facts? The facts are that you’re supposed to not contest if you don’t have just Ghanaian citizenship.”
Gabby Asare Otchere-Darko, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) stalwart and political strategist, has said that any individual who intends to contest a political office in Ghana must abide by the rules that define such contest.
Reacting to the Assin North parliamentary legal battle, Otchere-Darko said the rules of engagement must always be respected in political contests.
“Of course, the law is being used against him [the embattled Assin North NDC MP James Gyakye Quayson] and he holds a political office. And the law will be used against him if the law is against him,” Otchere-Darko said on Asaase Radio’s magazine show The Big Bulletin on Tuesday (26 April).
“It happened with my own friend when he decided to move to Ghana to contest, Adamu Daramani Sakande. What are the facts? The facts are that you’re supposed to not contest if you don’t have just Ghanaian citizenship,” he said.
“Did he hold another citizenship when he filed? Is it yes, or no? if so, what is the situation, what does the law say? What has been the precedence set by the court itself? So, it’s that simple. In order to contest a political office, you have to go by the rules and that’s all it is,” Otchere-Darko told Asaase Radio’s Beatrice Adu.
Listen to Gabby in the attached audio clip below:
Court ruling
The Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday (13 April 2022) that James Gyakye Quayson cannot hold himself as the Member of Parliament for Assin North in the Central Region.
The seven-member panel presided over by Justice Jones Dotse reached a 5:2 majority decision to injunct Quayson, whose position as an MP has been in dispute since he assumed his seat in January 2021, from going to Parliament.
Justices Jones Dotse, Mariama Owusu, Gertrude Torkornoo, Henrietta Mensah-Bonsu and Yonny Kulendi were the five Supreme Court judges who granted the injunction application, while Justices Agnes Dordzie and Nene Amegatcher dissented.
“The MP is restrained from holding himself as MP for Assin North and restrained from attending Parliament to conduct business on behalf of Assin North,” the presiding judge ruled.
Question of allegiance
Quayson, in spite of a high court judgment that declared his election as an MP in the 2020 parliamentary election unconstitutional, continued to hold himself as a Member of Parliament and was seen attending sittings of the House and carrying out his parliamentary duties.
Displeased with his actions, the petitioner in the high court action, Michael Ankomah-Nimfah, filed an application at the Supreme Court seeking an order to injunct Quayson. He also sought an interpretation of Article 94 (2a) of the 1992 constitution of the republic, which states that “a person shall not be qualified to be a member of Parliament if he – (a) owes allegiance to a country other than Ghana.”
The injunction order of the Supreme Court will remain in force until the final determination of the application seeking interpretation of Article 94 (2a).
Nicholas Brown
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