Flagbearer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), John Dramani Mahama has cut short his 4-day tour of the Bono Region and is returning to Accra to resolve alleged anomalies with the voter’s register detected in the ongoing Exhibition Process.
In a post on social media announcing the suspension of his tour of the Bono Region, the former president announced he is returning to Accra to attend to what he said is the increasing challenges with the voter register and the ongoing Exhibition Process.
The former president also indicated that he and his party will be addressing a press conference in due time to make known their concerns with the electoral process to the Ghanaian people.
“I’m cutting short my tour of the Bono Region to return to Accra because of the increasing reports of challenges with the voter register and the exhibition process. We’ll address a major press conference on the issues in due course,” he stated in the post.
This follows reports of omission of names of prospective voters from the newly compiled register and the alleged registration of voters in some constituency despite the expiration of the registration period.
Ernest Henry Norgbey, MP for the Ashaiman Constituency alleged on Friday, September 18, 2020 that the names of 21,000 prospective voters including his name were omitted from the electoral roll of his constituency.
But Electoral commission (EC) through its Public Relation Officer, Sylvia Annor dismissed his allegations. The EC subsequently issued a statement and attached a portion of the Ashaiman Constituency’s register which captured the details of Mr. Norgbey debunking his claim and describing it as false. The EC also explained in the statement that the names that are reportedly missing may be as result of incomplete voter transfer or, the presence of such names on the Exception List or Multiple
The MP, however, said the names were restored onto the register after he raised an alarm over the issue while insisting that some 7,000 names of registered voters are still missing from the register, a claim the EC has debunked.
On Monday, September 21, the EC issued another debunking purported issuance of new voter ID cards by its staff in a video circulating on social media. The Commission explained that the cards seen in the videos were printed at its headquarters for onward distribution to persons who were issued with duplicate cards during the just ended registration exercise and not the issuance of new voter ID cards as portrayed in the videos.
Mr. Mahama while responding to the development raised concerns over the replacement of voter ID cards without consultations with the various stakeholders particularly political parties.
