Lawyers for the Montie trio and the owners of the company have presented the petition for a pardon to the Presidency.
The petition was received by the Chief of Staff, Julius Debrah, at the Flagstaff House on Tuesday Morning.
[contextly_sidebar id=”1v6JtJiyG5Pn25VLqwTuPsfkHyT2yV7m”]The three, Alistair Nelson, Godwin Ako Gunn and Salifu Maase, alias Mugabe, were sentenced to serve four months in jail after they were found guilty of contempt charges.
The three were found to have threatened the lives Supreme Court judges during a radio discussion on Montie FM’s ‘Pamapaso’.
Following the incarceration of three, a group calling itself the Research and Advocacy Platform (RAP), started the petition pushing for signatures in a bid to persuade President Mahama to activate his prerogative of mercy powers under Article 72 of the 1992 Constitution.
Several ministers and high ranking officials of the incumbent National Democratic Congress (NDC), signed the petition to put pressure on the President to grant a presidential pardon.
The petition garnered signatures from notable NDC officials and government appointees including Minister of Tourism, Culture and Creative Arts, Elizabeth Ofosu-Adjare, Education Minister, Jane Naana Opoku Agyemang, Deputy Minister for Education, Samuel Okudzeto and the Gender, Children and Social Protection Minister, Nana Oye Lithur.
Supporters of the NDC have also held vigils in support of the three and some have even threatened to withhold votes from the party if the three were not released.
Undue pressure on President Mahama?
Despite calls for a pardon and sympathy for the convicted trio, stakeholders from various sections of society have kicked against a possible pardon.
The main argument is that any pardon would be a slight on the judiciary and an endorsement of the folly of the three.
Pressure group, Occupy Ghana, for instance cautioned President John Mahama against pardoning them as such an action would undermine the Judiciary.
Prominent novelist, Professor Ama Ata Aidoo also described the petition as “unfortunate” especially since it was “being signed by the likes of the Ministers of Education, and of Gender, Children and Social Protection.”
The founder of the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA), Professor Kwame Karikari also asserted that “no serious president in a democracy that will cede to a call like that under our circumstances. It will be politically suicidal for the president to accede to the call of his party.”
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By: Delali Adogla-Bessa/citifmonline.com/Ghana