Accra: An Accra High Court has dismissed an application by Nana Akua Owusu Afriyie against the Electoral Commission's planned election re-run in Ablekuma North Constituency. The Electoral Commission (EC) is scheduled to conduct a re-run in 19 of the 281 polling stations in the constituency on Friday, July 11, 2025.
According to Ghana News Agency, the presiding judge, Mr. Justice Ali Baba Abature, ruled that the application was unmeritorious. The NPP Parliamentary Candidate had filed a suit seeking to restrain the EC from conducting the re-run. The re-run was announced last week in a directive issued by the EC via a letter dated July 1, 2025, and a press statement on July 2, 2025.
Following the announcement, Akua Afriyie filed a judicial review application in the nature of certiorari, aiming to quash the EC's directive. The court stated that, after considering all arguments presented, it found the respondent, the Electoral Commission, better positioned to proceed, given its constitutional mandate to oversee elections in Ablekuma North. It further stated that the EC would be capable of providing appropriate compensation to the applicant in the event that she won the substantive case.
Represented by counsel Mr. Gary Nimako, the applicant argued that the EC's decision violated a January 4, 2025, High Court ruling. She contended that the EC committed 'a grave administrative error' by failing to comply with the court's order to collate and declare the parliamentary results in Ablekuma North. The applicant described the EC's action as 'arbitrary, capricious, unreasonable and wrongful exercise of discretionary power.'
According to the applicant, the EC acted 'in excess of its jurisdiction' by deciding to conduct a re-run in 19 polling stations without a court order varying or overturning the existing High Court judgment of January 4, 2025.
