NDC Urges EC to Use Selected Centers And Not District Offices for Mop – Up Exercise

The opposition National Democratic Congress NDC is calling on the Electoral Commission of Ghana to focus on centers that were marred with violence attacks and wide range breakdown of registration equipments during the mop – up exercise.

NDC in its statement released on Friday expressed dissatisfaction about the Electoral body’s move to use its District office across the country for Mop – Up exercise instead of its earlier statement that they would not do any blanket mop up exercise, and would be based on the situation on the grounds.

Below is the full statement:

ELECTORAL COMMISSION’S MOP-UP REGISTRATION MUST FOCUS ON AREAS WHERE EQUIPMENT BREAKDOWN, SHORTAGE OF REGISTRATION MATERIALS, VIOLENCE AND OTHER FACTORS AFFECTED THE MASS REGISTRATION EXERCISE

The National Democratic Congress is calling on the Electoral Commission to undertake the mop-up voter registration exercise in areas where equipment breakdown, shortage of registration materials, faulty equipment, cases of violence and change of registration schedules among other factors affected the ability of people to register in those areas instead of the blanket directive to carry out the exercise in their District Offices only.

The general public would recall, that when the Chairperson of the Electoral Commission, Mrs. Jean Mensa addressed the press a week ago on July 28, 2020 she said that the Electoral Commission will not undertake a ‘blanket’ mop-up exercise and that the mop-up registration exercise will be conducted on a needs basis. She stated further that “The mop-up exercise will be held in selected areas based on information from our offices as to the number of applicants who still have not presented themselves for registration”.

We are therefore astounded by the decision of the Electoral Commission to undertake the mop-up in their District Offices only.

We observed that several challenges confronted the mass voter registration exercise in some areas and this affected the registration of many qualified people.

The deployment of faulty and non-functional equipment and breakdown of the registration equipment resulted in situations where people who queued for several hours and days were unable to register in some registration centres.

Again, the violence at some registration centres, including the shooting incident by Akufo-Addo’s Minister for Special Development Initiatives, Hawa Koomson, coupled with the conscious attempts by agents of the NPP including security agencies to physically prevent citizens from registration adversely affected turnout in those areas.

Failure on the part of the EC to create registration centres or in the alternative deploy mobile registration vans to areas where citizens have to commute several kilometres to access the nearest registration centre also affected the ability of people to register.

In parts of the Volta Region, specifically Ketu South and Adaklu Constituencies, NPP agents and executives prevailed upon Electoral Commission Officials to reduce the number of officers who were assisting in the completion of the registration forms claiming that the process was too fast resulting in the registration of more people.

By the decision of the EC to conduct the mop-up exercise in its District Offices only, many people who otherwise availed themselves at registration centres to register but could not do so due to any of the factors stated above may have to commute several kilometres, at their own expense, to the EC offices mostly at the District capital before they can register.

We wish to state unequivocally that the right to vote as guaranteed in Article 42 of our Constitution is a fundamental human right and therefore under no circumstances should artificial impediments be created to prevent eligible citizens from registering and voting.

This is a clear affront to our democracy that must be condemned.

We wish to remind the Electoral Commission of its mandate in article 45 (e) of the 1992 Constitution that it is their duty to undertake programmes for the expansion of the registration of voters.

Any acts of voter suppression that seek to frustrate and discourage the registration of voters is unconstitutional and must not be accepted by all well-meaning Ghanaians.

We are therefore calling on the Electoral Commission to deploy equipment to areas where through no faults of citizens, they were unable to register instead of restricting the exercise to their District Offices where many people cannot afford to commute to register.

Signed
Elvis Afriyie-Ankrah
Director of Elections