Opoku Agyemang fails to separate EC boss from her lawyer
The Accra High Court has given the green light for lawyer Thaddeus Sory to continue to represent the Chairperson of the Electoral Commission (EC), Mrs Charlotte Osei, in a defamation suit filed by the EC boss.
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On July 25, 2017, Mrs Osei, sued Mr Maxwell Opoku –Agyemang, a lawyer representing some petitioners seeking her impeachment, for defamation and professional misconduct.
That was after the leakage of a 27-page petition to the Presidency calling for her impeachment.
“Conflict of interest’’
But Mr Opoku-Agyemang filed an application to restrain Mr Sory and his law firm, Sory@law from representing Mrs Osei, alleging conflict of interests.
According to his legal team, the defamation case, was premised on the impeachment petition, and as such Mr Sory, who is also the lawyer for the EC, could not represent Mrs Osei.
His lawyers argued that the petitioners, in seeking the impeachment of Mrs Osei, were fighting in the interest of the EC and, therefore, Mr Sory could not protect the interest of the EC by representing its boss.
They further contended that the manner in which the EC engaged the services of Mr Sory and his law firm was also a part of the subject matter of the petition.
Application thrown out
But in a ruling yesterday, the court, presided over by Mr Justice Kweku T. Ackaah-Boafo, dismissed the application, on both procedural grounds and on its merits.
It also awarded costs of Ghc 5,000 against Mr Opoku-Agyemang.
On procedural grounds, the court described the application as “misconceived and not sustainable,’’ because it named Mr Sory as the respondent even though he was not part of the substantive defamation case.
The substantive defamation case, the court held was titled Mrs Osei as plaintiff and Mr Opoku-Agyemang as defendant and, therefore, any application born out of the case must reflect that.
“The court cannot make an order to restrain Mr Thaddeus Sory when he is not party to the original suit,’’ Mr Justice Ackaah –Boafo said.
According to the court, the only way Mr Sory could become a party to the defamation case, was if an application for joinder was filed and the court approved
With regard to the application’s merits, the court held that there was no basis for the allegation of conflict of interest because the EC was not party to the defamation case filed by Mrs Osei.
Also, the court noted that the EC was not the petitioner in the impeachment petition and had also not raised any issue of conflict of interest with regard to Mr Sory representing Mrs Osei in the defamation case.
‘In the circumstance of this case, there is no basis to restrain Mr Sory for a real or a perceived conflict of interest’’, the presiding judge ruled.