The Supreme Court would on May 23, 2011 decide whether to continue hearing the case against Member of Parliament (MP) for Bawku Central, Adamu Daramani Sakande, or dismiss the case altogether.
This was after Egbert Faibille, counsel for the MP, on Thursday informed the Supreme Court that they had filed a submission of no case in the case in which Sumaila Bielbiel, a cattle dealer, is invoking the original jurisdiction of the Supreme Court to oust the MP from parliament based on allegations that he was also British.
Mr. Faibille told the court that in view of the fact that Bielbiel had no witnesses, among other reasons, they had filed a submission of no case, adding that the rules of evidence had not been complied with.
Justice Date-Baah, the presiding judge, stated that the court had received a submission of case.
According to him, Bielbiel had filed an affidavit in opposition while the principal state attorney in the case, Slyvester Williams, had not filed anything.
He said the court would give a ruling on it on May 23, 2012.
It would be recalled that Bielbiel, in January, told the nine-member panel hearing his case against the MP that all he wanted to say was contained in his affidavit, adding that if they wanted any further clarification they could call their own witnesses.
Bielbiel said these when attempts to get him to stick to the pleadings he had filed before the court proved futile as he kept veering off from his pleadings, which made counsel for the MP, Yoni Kulendi, to object to his line of evidence.
Mr. Kulendi objected to the line of questioning of Bielbiel, who said he met the MP in London in 1997, to which Kulendi said the issue of the meeting was never a part of his pleadings.
Slyvester Williams, the state attorney in the case, pleaded with the Supreme Court to adjourn the case to enable the plaintiff, Bielbiel, to seek the services of counsel as his inability to give evidence could be attributed to the fact that he did not have counsel.
When asked his opinion about the adjournment, counsel for the MP stated that the court had always made decisions bearing in mind Bielbiel did not have counsel, adding that when a lawyer freely offered his services, Bielbiel had said he did not need one and noted that �this is a man who knows what he is doing�.
The justices of the Supreme Court said there was an extent to which they could allow him some leeway because he did not have counsel, but they could not continue doing so in some instances because they could be accused.
The presiding judge, Prof Justice Date-Baah, in reaction to Bielbiel�s statement, said that was not how things were done and that he would be given the last opportunity to get himself a lawyer, or they would just listen to whatever he had to say.
Other panel members are Justices Julius Ansah, Sophia Adinyera, R.O. Owusu, Jones Dotse, Anin Yeboah, Baffoe-Bonnie, Sule Gbadegbe and Vida Akoto-Bamfo.
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