By Margaret Jackson

June 27, 2013

Mr Philip Addison, lead counsel for the petitioners in the on-going Supreme Court (SC) petition case seems to be confusing the NPP supporters because they have no clue as to where he is now as far as the case is concerned.

This is the man who has variously accused the NDC of trying to delay the determination of the case, but recent events have exposed Philip Addison of dragging his feet at the SC. He wants to proceed but do not know how since he seems to have run out of questions to continue with his cross-examination of the Electoral Commissioner, Dr Afari Gyan.

Mr Addison has therefore tried in vain to demand certain things from the Electoral Commission (EC) which would have thrown the case back to square one and delayed it unnecessarily.

On Monday June 24, Mr Addison attempted to torpedo a pre-agreement that both parties in the litigation reached with KPMG before the accounting firm started the pink sheet audit. He suddenly demanded a soft copy of the final report of the pink sheet audit from KPMG.

When Addison’s attention was drawn by the respondents that he cannot have the soft copy of the report and that he was breaking the pre-agreement with that demand, Addison put up a stoic face and pretended as if he was hearing about the pre-agreement for the very first time.

But the lawyers for the respondents argued with Addison fiercely until the justices realized that they needed to do something to bring the heated argument to a halt. They called the representative of the KPMG, Nii Amanor Dodoo who had earlier on tendered the report back to the witness box.

Nii Dodoo’s evidence tallied with that of the respondents that indeed there was a pre-agreement that KPMG for the purposes of preventing doctoring, manipulation and tampering was not going to give any of the litigating parties any soft copies of the report. The KPMG’s rep’s statement should have ended the matter, but as usual Philip Addison who has fought with everybody in court did not allow Nii Dodoo to go in peace.

Philip Addison engaged in argument with Nii Dodoo, but the latter stood his grounds to the admiration of many viewers and listeners. Finally, the justices called the time out and retired to their chambers. When they returned Philip Addison received the stunning verdict. Objection sustained! This was a stunning victory for the respondents.

But Addison will not go away as he filed another motion requesting the SC to compel the EC to provide the petitioners with collation forms for13 constituencies. According to him, Dr Afari Gyan promised to produce the collation results of those 13 constituencies, therefore, he was demanding it before he could continue with his unfinished cross-examination.

In his argument Addison stated that the NPP needs about 2,000 additional pink sheets to prosecute their case hence their demand of the collation sheets from the 13 constituencies. But the respondents will not allow Addison to have his way as they “fought” with him once again. The respondents claimed that it was too late in the game for Addison to have documents as it will delay the determination of the case.

The justices stepped in once again and went to the chambers to deliberate on the matter. When the justices returned they had bad news for Philip Addison as they rejected his motion. Addison’s body language in court showed how he received the bad news.

These two string of defeats handed to Philip Addison do not make him and his case look too good. Addison is now caught between the devil and the deep blue sea. He is caught between the feelings of the NPP supporters and the unfinished cross-examination of Dr Afari Gyan.

These are not good times for the NPP as their magic number in terms of the pink sheets submitted to buttress their case has also fallen short. And no one knows what the justices are currently thinking in terms of the pink sheets audit which did not help the NPP at all. Philip Addison is doing his best, but this may turn out to be the worst case he has ever decided to prosecute. Because the facts is not on his side!

That is why lately Philip Addison has continued to reel under series of objections which eventually has gone against him. You should be getting real worried if you are an NPP supporter because it ain’t looking too good for the NPP.

magjackson80@yahoo.com http://majjacks80.blogspot.com