The Electoral Commission (EC) has destroyed all defective presidential and parliamentary ballot papers printed for the Eastern Region.
The destruction took place on Tuesday, December 3, under the supervision of the Police Service, Eastern Regional Elections Security Taskforce and all constituency election directors of the political parties.
The Eastern Regional Director of the Electoral Commission, John Appiah Baffour, expressed satisfaction with the process.
“The exercise has been very successful. Actually, we brought all the parties together and the constituency executives of the NPP, NDC, and CPP, and all of them have been here. They checked the seals on the ballot paper bags, and they saw that everything was intact before we offloaded them and burned them. So it has been very successful,” he said.
This followed a reported incident involving defaced ballot papers.
Speaking at an emergency press briefing on Sunday, December 1, Mrs Jean Mensa, the Chairperson of the EC, noted that the decision was prompted by a report from National Security, which revealed that a single defaced ballot paper, earmarked for destruction, had been found at the Checkpoint Printing House, the facility responsible for producing the ballot papers for the two regions.
The commission, therefore, commenced the reprinting process and assured the public that strict measures were being implemented to prevent the recurrence of such incidents.
Mrs Mensa reaffirmed the Electoral Commission’s dedication to transparency and a credible electoral process.