The General Secretary of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Justin Frimpong Koduah, has shed some insight on the voting rights of suspended members of the party in the context of the upcoming presidential primaries.

According to him, the suspended members can still vote prior to facing a disciplinary committee or while the disciplinary process is underway.

The principle guiding this, he said, is the presumption of innocence until a final verdict is reached in their case.

He said this at a press conference held in Accra ahead of the November 4, NPP Presidential Primaries.

“Per our party constitution what this presupposes is that a person can be suspended before appearing at a disciplinary committee or when a disciplinary committee would have been initiated.

“But as a rule and in line with that rule of law, there is what we refer to as the presumption of innocence until a matter is determined. So whereby a person has been suspended under this provision, has not gone through a disciplinary committee and they have also not come out with the verdict and recommended their verdict to the constituency executives, such person will vote,” he stated.

This means that any person who has been suspended and is yet to appear before a disciplinary committee, or in the process of a disciplinary committee trial but a final action judgement has not been arrived at, will be allowed to vote.

However, if an individual has been through a disciplinary committee, received a recommendation, and faced sanctions that have been endorsed by the constituency executive committee, they will not have voting rights.

Nonetheless, the General Secretary noted that there could be conditional amnesty, to allow the constituency executive grant pardon to allow suspended individuals to vote based on the merit of their situation.

“However, where the person has gone through a disciplinary committee and the DC has come out with recommendation and has submitted the same to the constituency executive committee and sanctions have been applied to the person, such a person shall not be entitled to vote. But also, under conditional amnesty, the constituency executive can look at the merit of their case and pardon such people to vote,” he added.

What the NPP constitution states about suspended executives voting

Article 3 (7) of the NPP constitution states, a member may be suspended from membership of the party or holding any office in the party pending an enquiry into his or her conduct by a Disciplinary Committee.

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