New register: Publish names of law breakers – CDD-Ghana
The Director of Advocacy and Policy Engagement at the Ghana Center for Democratic Development (CDD-Ghana), Dr Kojo Asante, has admonished the Electoral Commission to publish names of electoral lawbreakers.
On the back of the completion of the voter registration exercise, with some anomalies to be cleared, Dr Asante said he agrees with calls for “the publication of persons who have done multiple registrations or have breached laws”.
He advocated deliberate and transparent processes in prosecuting people who flout the electoral laws to serve as deterrence.
He wants it to be public so everyone knows the consequences of engaging in such acts to desist from the practice.
The opposition NDC had called for an independent entity to scrutinise the voter roll and also publish registration centres and names of the people involved in anomalies.
Even though, Dr Asante agreed with the release of the names he kicked against the independent audit.
“I don’t agree, I don’t think we need an independent audit of it,” he emphasised during discussions on Joy News’ Newsfile programme on Saturday, August 15, 2020.
His reason was that a 16-member committee to supervise further cleaning of the provisional register has been put in place by the EC.
The committee, he said, includes police party representatives, IT experts, CSOs and others, and all issues can be addressed by the committee.
He said the NDC can also object to any anomalies during the exhibition which will be taken up by the district offices of the EC to investigate and address the matters.
CDD-Ghana gives EC thumbs up
Several Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) had opposed the acquisition of a new voter roll due to several reasons including the cost.
Parliament approved over GHC 400million for the compilation of the register less than eight months before the December elections
Dr Asante explained that he struggled to see how “we were going to compile a new register in the context of COVID-19 and the time pressure that the EC had to deal with” coupled with some court cases.
“So, I think the EC has to be commended for being able to bring the process, at least the data collection to an end,” he applauded.
However, he maintained that the development should not dismiss the argument and the position of the CDD-Ghana and the other CSOs.
You have no case – Baako tells NDC
The Editor-in-chief of the New Crusading Guide Newspaper, Kweku Baako, who was also a guest on the same show, rejected suggestions of an independent audit of the new voter register.
The Editor-in-chief of the New Crusading Guide newspaper pointed existing structures and systems at the EC that are sufficient to address all issues associated with the register.
“What are we going to call an independent auditor to do that the existing laws cannot do? I don’t think they have a case,” Mr Baako said.
He was of the view that the NDC “has been inconsistent, it has been moving from one level to another level, they never appear to be satisfied with the process”.
“As we speak, do we have a legal regime relative to scrutinise the register? He questioned.
For him, if the NDC “is so concerned and they think they have the evidence they know where to go”.
He explained that the deduplication process, the adjudication body that resolves challenge cases and the exhibition process are all in place to ensure a credible register.
“There are many processes that when they are combined and properly managed and activated can address their concerns but to ask for an independent audit by an audit body is just recycling this element of suspicion that they have been doing from day one,” he concluded.
NDC position on bloating of register
The NDC’s Director of Elections, Elvis Afriyie Ankrah, has accused the EC of under-reporting figures of registered voters in its strongholds and over-reporting in the governing NPP’s stronghold.
This the party said was as unacceptable.
To buttress his point, he said party agents “have discovered discrepancies in the data we collated and that of the EC, some of which the EC has referred to as mistakes emanating from reports submitted by their officers from the regions.
“Interestingly, while the EC under-reported in our strongholds, they over-reported in our opponent strongholds.
“In the Ashanti Region, the EC has reduced figures they already published by 40,000 following our due diligence…there are more corrections to be made to the Ashanti figures that we will engage the EC on” adding that “ the EC under-reported figures in the Oti region by 10,127 at the end of phase two”.
This and many other factors, he said, demands scrutiny of the voter roll by a third party.