General News of Saturday, 27 April 2013
Source: Joy Online
Editor in Chief of the New Crusading Guide newspaper says he is disappointed with the performance of the Counsel for the second respondent in the ongoing election petition case.
Kweku Baako Jnr said Quarshie-Idun has been “shoddy” and “sloppy” in his cross-examination of the witness-in-chief of the petitioners.
Conceding that he knows very little about the law, Baako Jnr said “instinctively” the quality shown by Quarshie-Idun has been below par.
The Counsel for the second respondent took over the baton of cross-examination on Wednesday and subjected the witness, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia to a rigorous cross-examination, interlaced with humour at some point.
In an attempt to discredit the witness, Quarshie-Idun, challenged allegations by the witness that there were 22 ghost polling stations which were introduced in the elections without the knowledge of the petitioners.
He produced a letter purported to have been signed by one of the officials of the petitioners assigning a polling agent to one of the ghost polling stations. He wondered how the petitioners will assign a polling agent to a polling station they were not aware of.
Dr Bawumia explained that signing a document assigning a polling agent to a station does not legitimize the illegality perpetrated by the EC.
He maintained the names and codes of these 22 polling stations were not part of the original 24,000 polling stations provided by the EC before the elections.
On his second day of cross-examination, the counsel had quite an encounter with the gritty witness and an alert counsel on the opposite side, whose objections forced Quarshie-Idun to withdraw two of his documents to support his cross examination.
At 12:15 Quarshie Idun requested for a recess and at 1520 he again requested for an adjournment all of which were granted.
The presiding Judge, William Atuguba who appeared a bit surprised asked the counsel why he was calling for an early adjournment. He was fatigued, he answered.
Discussing the election petition and the twists and turns that have gone on so far at the Supreme Court, Kweku Baako Jnr maintained the EC Counsel has not shown enough depth.
He said the outcome on the election petition will depend largely on the quality of defence by the second respondent but added so far, he has not been impressed.
He said the counsel for the first and third respondents must be worried about the performance of Quarshie-Idun.
But a member of legal team of the third respondent Nana Ato Dadzie disagreed. He said Quarshie-Idun has his own style and like a boxer he “picks his points.”
He said he may not be flowery but he was on point.
Nana Ato Dadzie said the counsel got the witness to concede to real material facts and that is good enough.