By Sylvanus Koroma
In order to determine the correctness or incorrectness for a petitioner in filing a petition lies on the gazetted results, without which the filing of a petition is meaningless. This is why the law repeatedly states that as soon as the results are announced the National Returning Officer must/shall publish and gazette the results.
The gazetted results are the official results that the petitioner(s) will use in court to make his/her/their claim(s) for the petition as provided in law.
The results announced are based and are from the results that the national returning officer in this case Konneh had already received in a tallied, computed, and certified form. This is why the law mandates him to publish and gazette as soon as he has announced the received results.
Except if my revered colleagues are in support that ECSL should not produce the results and must remain untransparent and that the petitioner(s) is/are to petition to the Supreme Court without the evidence for the challenge/petition.
If that is your take, my esteemed colleagues, I will not subscribe to the view of the American Ambassador that the time to challenge or petition has long passed especially knowing the position of the aforesaid court in the consolidated cases of Sylvia & Samura Kamara’s cases as precedent!
In that matter, even without touching on the substance of the case – the court dismissed the matter because the petitioners among other reasons failed to provide evidence for their case.
How can you for instance argue on irregularities or fraud on your petition of result when you do not have the said result that you want to prove your case on?
There are both Constitutional and other statute violations by ECSL, particularly including the primary statute, PEA, 2022, that ECSL has violated to confer advantage to both Bio and the SLPP.
I am maintaining my argument that until the June 2023 election results are published and gazetted the elections are not over; and that the American Ambassador was not correct in saying that the time to challenge the results has long passed.
