The ruling National People’s Party has responded to opposition United Democratic Party (UDP) statement over the Supreme Court’s election petition ruling. 

The UDP insisted it didn’t lose the December 4 presidential election to President Adama Barrow despite the nation’s top court’s ruling.

However, the NPP has denounced the UDP statement and maintained that the court’s ruling was “fair and satisfactory.”

NPP’s deputy spokesman Seedy SK Njie said: ”Consequent to the recent statement issued by A N M Ousainu Darboe, UDP and some unfortunate statements circulating in social media seeking to denigrate the recent decision of the Supreme Court in the election petition brought by United Democratic Party (UDP), the National People’s Party (NPP) has deemed it necessary to release this statement.

“Adama Barrow won the election by a very convincing number. The election was monitored by several international and national election observers who all commended the conduct of the said election.

“Following the said loss, the UDP has made several unsubstantiated claims in a bid to have the verdict of the Gambian people set aside. 

“After the election, one of the claims made related to the registration of non-Gambians. The registration of voters by IEC was very transparent and complaints about this should have been made to the Revising court as required by the Elections Act. 

“The Supreme Court would not therefore have been the proper forum to determine this issue.”

“On the other issues raised in the petition NPP answered same and was satisfied that they would have prevailed at trial despite the 2000 pages of documents submitted by UDP.

“NPP is satisfied that the Supreme Court of The Gambia carried out its constitutional mandate in dealing with the UDP petition. 

“The Supreme Court could not legally proceed with the hearing of the petition on its merits without the UDP complying with the preliminary issues of law which would give the Court the jurisdiction and the mandate to proceed with such a hearing. 

“It was the failure of UDP to comply with the law that caused the striking out of the petition and prevented the hearing on the merits. That was what the Supreme Court determined,” Mr Njie added.

“The NPP and His Excellency Adama Barrow have always accepted decisions of the courts including the Supreme Court decisions whether for or against the government without seeking to vilify the courts in any way. 

“We would ask that all will act in a similar manner. Our judges must be allowed to give their judgments based on their oaths of office and their understanding of the law.

“All of us need to respect our laws and the institutions created by our Constitution to ensure that we live in a peaceful and democratic country where we can continue to approach our courts with our grievances. 

“We must not encourage our citizenry to ignore the laws and our institutions and must have respect for the Rule of Law,” Mr Njie said. 

Reporting by Adama Makasuba

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