The Electoral Commission (EC) has been speaking for the first time since the Supreme Court gave its final judgement on the 2020 election petition.

The Electoral Commission (EC) says the Supreme Court’s ruling on the just-ended election petition has given it “an international vindication”.

Speaking on The Big Bulletin with Beatrice Adu, Dr Bossman Asare, deputy chairman of the EC in charge of corporate services said, “We were relieved right after the election because we know we did the right thing. The [Supreme] Court gave us an international vindication, so for us life is just normal; we have a lot of things, review of the election etc that we must engage in.”

He added, “As a Commission, we are doing what we have to do. There are a lot of administrative measures that must be put in place so that in future we’ll continue to be ahead of the game.”

“I think for us we didn’t see the court case as a challenge… we know it’s part of the work and life must go on.”

“The petitioner has not produced any evidence to rebut the presumptions created by the publication of CI 135 for which his action has failed. We have, therefore, no reason to order for a rerun … we accordingly dismiss the petition as having no merit,” Chief Justice Anin-Yeboah ruled.

With this unanimous, seven-member decision, the Supreme Court dismissed the petition.

The court determined that the petitioner had based his case on an error made by the chair of the Electoral Commission during the declaration of the election result on 9 December 2020, but that error could not void the will of the people in electing a president.

The Supreme Court also held that the error made by the EC in using total votes cast as the basis for reckoning the total valid votes during the declaration was corrected and that the correction was made in accordance with the law.

The petitioner, John Mahama, had claimed that none of the candidates who stood in the presidential election had obtained more than 50% of the votes cast.

Mahama alleged that the second respondent, President Akufo-Addo, won the election through vote padding.

He also claimed the candidate had benefited from arithmetical and computational errors. He concluded that the EC’s declaration of President Akufo-Addo was unconstitutional, given that he did not obtain more than 50% of the votes cast.

Mahama wanted the Supreme Court to rule that the presidential election result as declared by the EC chairperson, Jean Mensa, was in breach of the constitution.