By William
Yaw Owusu
Thursday
March 01, 2018
Embattled chairperson of the Electoral Commission
(EC) Charlotte Osei, has hit back at one of the six commissioners accusing her
of turning her position into that of a sole-commissioner.
She stated in a memo in response to Ebenezer Aggrey-Fynn’s earlier claim
that no meetings are being held by the commissioners.
According to Mrs Osei, as far as she is concerned,
there is nothing happening at the EC which requires urgent attention to warrant
a commission meeting and parried criticisms that she was carrying herself as a
Sole-Commissioner.
She said she had stayed all matters requiring urgent
‘policy direction’ since the petition to initiate impeachment processes against
her and her two deputies was filed and therefore she could not be said to be
running ‘one man’ show.
Warning
Memo
Last week, a memo written by Mr. Aggrey-Fynn
protesting the inability of the EC chairperson to hold commission meetings hit
the media when he accused Mrs Charlotte Osei of acting like a sole-commissioner.
He had said that Mrs Charlotte Osei had refused to hold
meetings with the other six commissioners to discuss the way forward for the
independent electoral body, complaining that her action was in clear breach of
the EC Act, 1993.
The commission member, therefore, gave Mrs.
Charlotte Osei a one-week ultimatum to arrange a meeting to enable the commission
to carry out its functions, failure of which he said he was going to use every
legal avenue to get the matter settled.
In the memo written on February 16, 2018, Mr.
Aggrey-Fynn had indicated that he sent an earlier one on 21st
August, 2017 on the same issue but “regrettably I am yet to receive an
acknowledgement of it nor seen any action on the content.”
Equal
Response
However, the second memo was responded to by Mrs.
Charlotte Osei on Monday, February 26, 2018, saying the agenda of the first
memo sent by Mr. Aggrye-Fynn was “vague” and “was insufficient to form a basis
of an agenda for a commission meeting.”
She said at the time the first memo was written, there
was an Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO) investigation into the
commission’s staff Endowment Fund, as well as another EOCO investigation into
the allegations contained in the petition sent to the presidency for her
removal.
“The same petition has been presented to His
Excellency the President and at the same time, your memo suggesting the need
for a commission meeting, the petition had been forwarded by His Excellency the
President to Her Ladyship the Chief Justice for judicial inquiry,” she
indicated.
She told Mr Aggrey-Fynn in the memo that the matters
which were before the EOCO and those before the Chief Justice could not form
part of “the matters which require policy direction of the commission, or the
commission risks being seen to be compromising or interfering in the ongoing
investigations of inquiry.”
Sole-Commissioner
Tag
She said it would be helpful for Mr Aggrey-Fynn “to assist
me by indicating which policy decisions I have taken during this period which
belonged properly in the domain of the commission.
“To the best of my knowledge, all matters that
require the policy direction of the commission have been stayed pending the
conclusion of several ongoing investigations by different statutory bodies and
authorities on the commission. If matters were considered urgent, they were
circulated and brought to the attention of all commission members.”
Endowment
Fund
Mrs Osei said when EOCO sent a confidential letter
updating her on the status of the investigation into the staff Endowment Fund, she
made sure it was brought to the attention of all the members of the commission
and also the input of all the members was requested in August 2017, into the
preparation of the commission’s budget.
The EC boss said additionally, the views of the
commission members were sought in the ROPAL case involving the commission and
in October, the commission members had given their approval to the negotiation
for allowances of staff, saying, “These matters, in my view, were matters
requiring commission members’ direction.”
Open-Door
Policy
She said in the memo that the input of Amadu Sulley,
her deputy in-charge of Operations, is sought on management matters, saying, “All
matters are handled with the active involvement of the respective line
directors. I fail to see how these actions amount to positioning myself as a
sole commissioner.”
Clear
Sabotage
Mrs Charlotte Osei accused five of the commissioners,
including Mr. Aggrey-Fynn, of holding a meeting without inviting her, although
she has the sole prerogative to convene commission meetings; and appeared to
suggest that they are sabotaging her.
“I recall a meeting convened at your instance with
other commission members (Maida, Adjalo, Sulley, Dadzawa). I was neither
invited nor informed of this meeting, although you yourself acknowledge now
that meetings can only be convened by the chairperson under the law,” she fired.
She added, “I have also not been informed by you
what the outcome of your meeting was neither was I informed of the agenda prior
to and after the meeting.”
Mrs Charlotte Osei said that she is facing
impeachment processes alongside her two deputies and that the ongoing processes
required their respective presence at the committee sittings “at least four
days in a week, as well as meeting with lawyers, witnesses and various other
matters.”
She posited, “If the commission meeting has not been
called, it is clearly because of the peculiar and unprecedented situation in
which the commission finds itself and not because anyone has arrogated
themselves the power of a sole-commissioner as you allege.”
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