Assin North Constituency, Mr James Gyakye Quayson
A five-member panel of the Supreme Court presided over by Justice Yaw Appau, has struck out an application by the Member of Parliament (MP) for Assin North Constituency, Mr James Gyakye Quayson, through which he prayed the apex court to invoke its supervisory jurisdiction and assume jurisdiction over the dual citizenship case filed against him at the Cape Coast High Court.
Additionally, the Justice Appau-led panel of Justices which included Justices Gabriel Pwamang, Gertrude Torkornoo, Nene Amergatcher and Yoni Kulendi, awarded a cost of GHS5,000 against the opposition MP in favour of the first interested party, Mr Michael Ankomah Nimfah, the petitioner.
Justice Appau described the MP’s application as “premature”, adding: “we think you didn’t lay the foundations well.”
The court, thus, said there was nothing before it as far as the application was concerned.
The Electoral Commission of Ghana is the second interested party in the matter.
The Supreme Court’s decision came 24 hours to judgment day by Cape Coast High Court.
The court noted that the application ought to have been first raised at the High Court for determination.
The petitioner prayed the court to order a rerun of the Assin North parliamentary poll.
On Wednesday, 12 May 2021, a member of the petitioner’s legal team, Mr Henry Nana Boakye, told the media that: “One of the reliefs we are seeking is for the court to order for a re-election to be conducted in Assin North”.
“We have stated our case forcefully, and we have supported it with case evidence”, the National Youth Organiser of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) told journalists.
He said: “We have even filed our closing addresses, and we are sure that the respondents will be served”.
Mr Boakye noted that even though there are delay antics from the other party “just to drag the matter behind”, his team is “forthright and resolute that this matter will be determined and it will be determined on the merit of the case and based on the 1992 Constitution and the relevant laws regarding the qualification of an aspirant to be a candidate or to be elected as a member of parliament.”
The petitioner filed processes at the Cape Coast High Court to annul the declaration of Mr James Gyakye Quayson as the Member of Parliament for the constituency.
The opposition National Democratic Congress candidate polled 17,498 votes in the 2020 general elections to beat the NPP’s Abena Durowaa Mensah’s 14,793.
It later emerged that Mr Quayson held dual citizenship contrary Article 94 (2) (a) of the 1992 Constitution of Ghana, which states: ‘A person shall not be qualified to be a Member of Parliament if he – (a) owes allegiance to a country other than Ghana’.