By Nicholas Osei-Wusu
A Justice of the High Court, Justice Anna Taylor, says if politicians have accepted that elections are won at the Polling Station, they should not expect the Courts to pronounce poll winners.
She said, with adequate education and active participation of parties in the electoral processes, politicians and political parties must be prepared to accept results of elections.
“If the necessary education has gone on, the parties involved, they should also be ready to accept the results because I heard people say over and over again that elections are won at the polling stations. But, of course, they know where the elections are won, at the end of the day, they want to go to the Court for the courts to pronounce who has won. So we must understand the law, understand how they operate and I believe if there is trust system, then everything will go on smoothly”, Justice Taylor clarified.
According to her, the perceived long delays in election dispute adjudication in the law courts, parties must come to Courts very well prepared since all the rules of Court including law of procedure and Law of Evidence cannot be ignored in resolving election disputes.
She said, “people may expect that, immediately the petition is filed, within three days, everything must be resolved, it is not possible, because you should remember, there are even time lines. When you should even file your petition, the law has spelt it. Then when it is filed, the other party must respond. It all comes within time frames that have been set…but of course, the courts can manage its time, and allot more time to matters that are pending and give some priority to election petition.”
“The Judicial Service is ready, and the forums for resolving disputes are already available and when you look at the law, at times, it’s as if we ourselves, we are looking forward to having disputes and the law itself is ready to accommodate disputes”, the High Court Judge noted.
Justice Taylor gave the advice in Kumasi during a Stakeholder Dialogue Series on ‘Enhancing Civic Engagement and Institution-building for Sustainable Development in Africa’ organized by the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre.
Touching on inclusive participation in Ghana’s electoral processes, the High Court Judge observed that, voter fatigue is emerging among eligible voters in the country in recent times citing her personal encounters with some members of the society in, noting that, the electorate think their votes do not change anything in their personal lives or social progress.
