The hearing is set to open on 15 February and close on 3
March unless more time is needed.
The court challenge of the results of the 2015 Presidential
election was mentioned in court on Thursday 14th January and hearing
will start on Monday 15 February, the Chief Justice announced.
This information was
also conveyed to stakeholders in a meeting between the lawyers of the Union for
Change movement, those of the respondents in the case and Chief Justice
Mathilda Twomey on Wednesday.
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| Antoine Onezime; CEO of SBC |
The respondents - James Michel, Hendrick Gappy, the
Chairperson of the Electoral Commission and the Attorney General, Ronny
Govinden, have be given 14 days to file their defense. The court will reconvene
on 9 February and more time will be granted if such is needed until the hearing
begins on 15 February.
Because of the high
public interest of the case, the Union for Change movement had requested that
the court case be filmed by the Seychelles Broadcasting Corporation (SBC) and
that it is also projected outside the courtroom on a big screen for opposition
supporters who would not be able to gain admittance to the courtroom which can
only accommodate 48 persons.
But Mr Ramkalawan said that “the SBC have said that they do
not have the resources”, to film the hearing. Three lawyers have also been
assigned the responsibility of producing a daily summary of the day’s
proceedings which will be made available to the public.
The petitioner, Mr Ramkawalan is represented by a team of
lawyers led by Bernard Georges, while Basil Hoareau is representing James
Michel, Samantha Aglae is representing the Electoral Commission and the
Attorney General’s office is represented by David Esparon. Some 80 witnesses are
expected to be heard during the court of the trial.
The two petitions were filed after the Presidential runoff
which took place between 16 and 18 December.
The first petition lodged on December 28 requests that the
Constitutional court declares null and void the results of the second round and
the subsequent “election” of James Michel as it alleges that the Electoral
Commission wrongly calculated the results. The petition wants the
Constitutional court to interpret clearly what the Constitution says regarding
the calculation of the percentage of votes.
The second, an Election petition filed on January 5, claimed
that the Presidential runoff did not comply with certain provisions of the
Elections Act and that the election was not free and fair because numerous
illegal practices were committed by the ruling party, Parti Lepep.
Source:Today in Seychelles
