Afari-Gyan exposed on tamper proof envelopes

Ghana’s Electoral Commissioner, Dr. Kwadwo Afari-Gyan, was on Tuesday exposed to have lied on the issue of whether tamper proof envelopes had serial numbers or not as he was confronted by samples of the tamper evident envelopes by the lead counsel for the petitioners which showed clearly that the envelopes had numbers embossed on them.

It would be recalled that while being led to give his evidence in chief by Counsel for the Electoral Commission, James Quarshie Idun, Dr Afari-Gyan stated categorically that ballot papers, stamps used at polling stations and tamper evident envelopes used to keep election materials, did not have serial numbers or any numbers on them and wondered why lead counsel for the petitioners, Philip Addison, had created the impression that these materials had numbers when he was cross examining the witness for the 1st and 3rd respondents, Johnson Asiedu Nketiah.

“These items do not have any numbers on them, and I wonder why suddenly people want to create numbers on them”, he said.

On Monday while being cross examined by Counsel Addison, Dr. Afari-Gyan, however, admitted for the first time that the ballot box seals and stamps had numbers written on them but again denied that the tamper evident envelopes had numbers.

While cross examining the EC Boss on Tuesday, Philip Addison inquired from the witness whether he still stood by his statement that tamper evident envelopes had no numbers. The question which seemed to have unsettled Dr. Afari-Gyan for some minutes, went unanswered until the Counsel for the Commission, Quarshie Idun rose to object to the question, which was sustained by the bench.

Counsel Addison followed up by bringing out three samples of the tamper evident envelopes for the Electoral Commissioner to identity. The EC Boss identified the items as tamper evident envelopes. The flow of cross examination was, however, interrupted again by Counsel Quarshie Idun who objected to the line of questioning with the able support of Counsels for John Mahama and the NDC, Tony Lithur and Tsatsu Tsikata who all prayed the court to stop the petitioner’s counsel.

The joint objection of the three respondents was overruled by a 6-3 verdict, allowing Counsel Addison to inquire from the EC Boss if he could identify the envelopes by numbers. But even before Dr. Afari-Gyan could answer the question, his counsel rose again to object to the question, but this was also overruled by an 8-1 ruling, paving the way for the question to be answered.

Finally, Dr. Afari Gyan accepted that there were numbers on all the three envelopes he had been presented with, identifying them as having the numbers 22484, 22485, 22486 on them.

To compound matters, Dr. Afari-Gyan stated that he had an observation to make on the envelopes. His first observation was that the envelopes had no markings to show they were that of the Electoral Commission. This response brought in Justice Baffoe Bonnie, who inquired from the EC Boss if by that observation he meant that the EC's tamper evident envelopes had certain markings, which were absent from the ones he had been handed.

Strangely, Dr. Afari-Gyan stated that he had not seen the particular envelopes used in the last election and could thus not confirm whether there were any marks on them which were not on the ones he had been presented with in court.