EC War Escalates As Amadu Joins Fray

By Maxwell Ofori

The drama at the Electoral Commission (EC) has taken a new twist, with the Deputy Chair in charge of Operations, Mr Amadu Sulley threatening to sue his boss, Mrs Charlotte Osei for

Defamation, after the latter had made a series of allegations against him.

Whilst responding to the 27 points petition filed by a group called 'Concerned Staff' of EC, through their Lawyer, Mr Maxwell Opoku Agyeman, Mrs Osei made a series of allegations against her deputies.

She said it was worth pointing out that whilst the Chairperson was persistently accused of arrogance and taking unilateral decisions, there was "ample evidence of extreme arrogance, ineptitude and blatant breaches of the law by the deputy Chairpersons."

The first female Chair of the Commission gave a few examples, where she said Mr. Amadu Sulley, Deputy Chairperson in charge of Operations collected some 'GHS6m' from some political parties for the organisation of primaries without recourse to her, the Chairperson.

"The Deputy Chairperson Operations collected funds above GHc6m (Six million Ghana cedis) in cash from some political parties for the organisation of party primaries without recourse to the structures of the Commission and without the involvement of the finance department of the Commission," She stated.

According to the EC Chair, who is a Lawyer, "Political party primaries were treated as a private commercial project by the Deputy Chairperson Operations (Mr. Amadu Sulley), with funds paid directly into the personal accounts of key staff for functions to be performed for party primaries. An internal audit report, highlighting widespread malfeasance in the conduct of party primaries, under the supervision of the Deputy Chairperson Operations, is attached and marked 'CO28A'. This situation cannot be allowed to continue," She observed.

The 'exposé' through her response did not only contain the above alleged rot but a few others which if proven to be true, breaches the law governing the operations of the electoral body of the Republic.

The petitioners, in their claim indicated that "Mrs. Charlotte Osei persistently antagonised the then opposition NPP, prior to the 2016 General Elections to the extent that she never met any of the leadership who sought audience with her to discuss issues of concern."

Meanwhile, in her reply, Madam Charlotte Osei was surprised that the "Concerned Staff were also spokespersons for the NPP with seeming intimate knowledge of the grievances of the NPP."

She continued that contrary to the impression of the petitioners, the leadership of the NPP was in a position to confirm several meetings held with her (Mrs. Osei), to discuss their concerns ahead of the 2016 elections.

"Indeed, in one of those meetings with the two Deputy Chairpersons, it was confirmed that the Deputy Chairperson Operations had unilaterally and without the knowledge of the Chairperson or the Commission created over 1000 (one thousand) additional polling stations for the district level elections of September 1, 2015," she added.

She continued, with instances that: "The Deputy Chairperson Operations has persistently instructed officials to carry out illegal vote transfers on the Voter Management System in clear breach of the law and operational policies of the Commission. Such actions have major implications for the integrity of the work of the Commission and constitute abuse of office," she alleged.

Again, Mrs. Osei wrote that "in June 2017, the annual leave of Deputy Chairperson Operations was approved by the Deputy Chairperson CS without recourse to the Chairperson and signed on behalf of Chairperson by Deputy Chairperson CS while she herself was on leave.

"This is clearly symptomatic of poor knowledge of corporate governance and managerial ineptitude. Indeed, the Deputy Chairperson CS has arrogated to herself the powers of the Chairperson, convening commission meetings and taking other ultra vires decisions in clear breach of the Law," she opined.

Efforts made to get Mr. Amadu Sulley for confirmation of his threat to sue Charlotte was unsuccessful as numerous phone calls, text and whatsapp messages sent to him were not responded to.

An Accra based radio station, Starr FM, however, quoted him as saying: "I want to assure you that it's not true. I have all the documents and I am going for legal advice."

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