The Electoral Commission (EC) disqualified the Progressive People’s Party (PPP) flagbearer from the Presidential race because the party sued them over the high filing fees they were charging, the policy director of the party has alleged.
Kofi Asamoah Siaw speaking on Asempa FM’s Ekosii Sen Programme Friday argued that the EC only sought to use the filing of nominations as a form of ‘pay back’ for dragging the commission to the law courts over the quantum of fees being charged.
“It is because of that [suit]; they are just seeking to sack us from the race for no reason…even in Legon, you could see clearly that the President is losing the elections and that is why they are doing everything in their power to unlawfully disqualify the PPP…,” he argued.
The PPP dragged the EC to court after the election management body announced that it is charging GHC10,000 and GHC50,000 as filing fees for Parliamentary and Presidential aspirants respectfully.
The party sought to place an injunction on the commission causing it to halt the acceptance of banker’s draft of the money by aspirants.
The EC was only able to accept the filing fees after the injunction was dismissed by the courts.
And this suit, Kofi Asamoah Siaw claimed is a major contributory factor to the disqualification of their aspirant by the commission.
The PPP’s flagbearer, Papa Kwesi Nduom, was disqualified from the December 7 polls because the number of subscribers to his forms did not meet the EC’s requirements; an action the party had vowed to resist.
Nduom was disqualified together with 11 other presidential aspirants in the race.
Since his disqualification, Dr Nduom has met with the EC boss and argued his case but to no avail.
The party has since indicated their resolve to head to the law courts to seek redress.
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