Incompetent petition filed by competent lawyer: Kweku Baako reacts to EC staff petition

The Editor in Chief of the New Crusading Guide  has described the petition filed by some aggrieved staff of the Electoral Commission, demanding the impeachment of Chair,  Charlotte Osei, as an incompetent petition filed by a competent lawyer.

Kweku Baako said the content of the petition cannot constitute grounds for the impeachment of the EC Chair as most of them are administrative lapses that can be verified and corrected. He also observed a petition without a name is a problem.

Lawyer Maxwell Opoku Agyeman has petitioned the Presidency on behalf of some unnamed staff asking for the impeachment of the EC Chair for misconduct and fraud.

In the petition, the staff claim her decision to cancel a contract awarded to Superlock Technologies Limited (STL) -- a company contracted to supply and manage Biometric Voter Registration machines (BVRs) and the Biometric Voter Devices (BVDs), as well as her directive for the payment of $76,000 to IT firm, Dream Oval, were fraudulent. 

"The Commission signed a contract with Super Tech (STL) Limited on the premise of that Voter Registration Exercise was going to be electoral area based. Upon assumption of office as Chairperson of the Commission, Mrs. Charlotte Osei unilaterally abrogated the said contract without recourse to the same Commission that approved the earlier version."

Charlotte Osei in a response has described the contents of the petitions as frivolous, baseless and motivated by malice and ill will, adding that the allegations in her view, were nothing but a product of an overactive evil imagination, and do not deserve any serious attention.

Sharing his thought on the confusion at the EC, Mr. Baako revealed that the unknown staff petitioned both EOCO and the Presidency on the 13 July 2017. He stated that EOCO has already invited the EC Chair to provide respnses.

Mr. Baako believes despite the incompetent nature of the petition, some of the concerns should be probed to restore the corporate integrity of the Commission.

Kweku Baako also said the comment of the Minority Leader, Haruna Iddrisu accusing President Akufo-Addo of involvement in the petition to impeach the EC Chair is needless and misguided.