Court action by disqualified Ketu South Parliamentary aspirant is ill conceived - NDC

The National Democratic Congress has filed a motion before the Accra High Court seeking to set aside an application for injunction on its parliamentary primaries in the Ketu South Constituency of the Volta region.

A disqualified aspirant, Jim Yao Morti is asking the court to restrain the NDC from going ahead with the primaries in the Constituency until the party is ready to include him in the race.

He also wants the court to declare that he has satisfied all the needed requirements to contest in the race.

Mr. Morti says the party’s decision to exclude him from the contest is undemocratic, and a grand scheme to give the incumbent Member of Parliament, Fifi Kwetey an easy walk to Parliament.

The court action forced the party to postpone indefinitely the primary there which had been scheduled for last week Saturday.

Lawyer for Mr. Morti, Joseph Bernard Ashalley has insisted his client adequately responded to petitions which accused him of fraud. They thus do not understand why the party has disqualified him from the race.

But the NDC disagrees.
The writ and affidavits in support by the Director of Administration of the NDC Emmanuel Zumakpeh is “praying the court for an order to strike out plaintiff’s pleadings and set aside the writ of summons and statement of claims under the inherent jurisdiction of the court against the NDC, NDC vetting committee chairman, NDC Volta regional chairman, NDC Ketu South constituency chairman and MP Fifi Kwetey, on the grounds that it discloses no reasonable cause of action against them and an abuse of the court processes.”

The affidavit says: “this present action is not only improper but an abuse of the court process and has been instituted with the malicious intention to sensationalize, and is ill conceived.”

At the first sitting on Tuesday, the judge asked the two sides to try and settle the issues out of court since it is a family matter. Lawyer for the plaintiff, Joseph Bernard Ashalley told the court the party has not invited them to sit down and discuss the issue.

He said the party has rather resorted to dragging his client’s name in the mud and painting him black.

The case was adjourned to Friday. The Volta Regional branch of the NDC has meanwhile suspended Jim Yao Morti over his decision to sue the party.