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Peacefmonline.com can confirm that the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Member of Parliament for Bawku Central, Adamu Dramani Sakande has been convicted on three counts of Perjury, False Declaration and Deceit of a Public Officer. He has thus been jailed two years concurrently on all counts by the Supreme court. A Bawku-based cattle farmer, Sumaila Biebel, in March 2009, filed a suit at the High Court challenging the eligibility of the NPP MP due to his dual citizenship on the grounds that he held both British and Burkinabe passports. The state took interest in the case and filed nine counts relating to his nationality, perjury, forgery of passport, election fraud and deceiving public officers to be elected as an MP against Mr Dramani. He was however exonerated on six of those charges on July 8, 2010, leaving with three charges of false declaration of office, perjury and deceiving a public officer. Adamu Sakande is also alleged to have, before the 2008 elections, made a false statement in an application to have his name included in the voters register. The accused is also alleged to have registered as a voter when the voters register was opened, and subsequently went ahead to vote in the December 2008 general elections, when he was not entitled to do so. Counsel for the NPP MP, Yoni Kulendi, appealed to the court to mitigate the outcome of the ruling because of the health concerns of the MP. According to him, Mr Dramani was a victim of circumstances, since he procured the services of a certain Stanley Opoku, who claimed to be a lawyer, to help him renounce his citizenship and was led to believe the renunciation had been done. But the court rejected the plea. More soon...