Senior Lecturer at the University of Ghana’s Department of Political Science, Dr.Isaac Owusu-Mensah has observed that in the days leading up to the 2020 general elections, most politicians defied all COVID-19 protocols to embark on rallies and this he believes was unfortunate.
Speaking to host, Samuel Eshun on e.TV Ghana’s Fact Sheet show, he noted that looking back at the electioneering period, the campaign rallies held by political parties without social distancing, among other things was an incident that marred the beauty of the process.
However, this was to be expected as he states that politics is an activity that involves so much passion.
“In the course of the electioneering process, I think we agreed that the parties were not going to have rallies but eventually the parties embarked on rallies. This is because politics has to do with passion and with passionate subjects like football, you must be very strong and you need to have control.”
Unfortunately, in the course of the campaign, political parties forgot that there was coronavirus which was infectious and as such there was a need for social distancing but they ignored all that”, he stated.
Meanwhile, commenting on the general mood of the 2020 elections, Dr. Owusu-Mensah shared that he was impressed with the conduct of the election and encouraged all Ghanaians to be proud of how far we have come amid the pandemic.
In his 10th address to the nation on measures put in place to cut the spread of Covid-19, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo said political parties can conduct their activities with the exemption of political rallies.
However, some days to the election, it was observed that some political parties were embarking on political rallies with no regard for safety protocols.
By: Alberta Dorcas N D Armah
