{"id":95104,"date":"2015-02-28T06:57:54","date_gmt":"2015-02-28T06:57:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/4cd.e16.myftpupload.com\/?p=95104"},"modified":"2015-02-28T06:57:17","modified_gmt":"2015-02-28T06:57:17","slug":"suspended-assembly-elections-ec-could-have-prevented-it-lawyer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/2015\/02\/suspended-assembly-elections-ec-could-have-prevented-it-lawyer\/","title":{"rendered":"EC could have prevented suspension of local elections – Lawyer"},"content":{"rendered":"
Alex Afenyo-Markin, lawyer for aspiring Assemblyman whose case led to the suspension of the District Assembly election<\/a>s,<\/strong><\/span> has blamed the Electoral Commission (EC) for the inconvenience.<\/p>\n Benjamin Eyi Mensah, a fisherman\u00a0sued the EC to court<\/strong><\/a><\/span> for preventing \u00a0him from filing his nomination to contest\u00a0in the\u00a0Eyipeh Electoral Area, before the maturation of the Constitutional Instrument \u00a0(CI) 85.<\/p>\n [contextly_sidebar id=”Y1HsbqtI8N3dV3ChcDdVaaLGOVGPdA5u”]The seven Supreme Court panel of judges led by Justice William Atuguba on Friday ruled in favour of the fisherman<\/strong><\/a><\/span> and declared the elections which was fixed for Tuesday March 3 as \u201cunconstitutional.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThe EC could have avoided all these, they could have saved the nation the cost if they had heeded to our advice…and responded to our petitions,\u201d\u00a0Afenyo-Markin said in an interview on Eyewitness News<\/strong>.<\/p>\n He urged the Electoral Commission to be circumspect and cautioned the EC \u201cnot to take its mandate in the constitution so lightly, It\u2019s a very sensitive mandate.\u201d<\/p>\n The Supreme Court declared that the law with which the EC wanted to hold the elections, CI 85, was not in force at the time nominations were closed.<\/p>\n