Director of Electoral Services at the Electoral Commission (EC), Dr. Serebour Quaicoe has said that tensions and agitations surrounding the move for the compilations of the new voters’ register are anticipated.
According to him, the EC won’t be derailed off their plans and that ground is being prepared for new voters register process to take off.
Speaking in an interview on the Happy Morning Show (HMS), Dr. Quaicoe “We are focused, the EC is not bordered at all, if you have worked in the electoral commission for a long time, these tension and agitations are anticipated. It’s hard for you to get a consensus from the political parties but the EC is the one close to the fire so from observations, you have to make decisions that will help you to work. So these agitations and stiff oppositions are normal things that we have faced for a very long time.”
Dr. Quaicoe’s assertion comes on the heels of series of demonstrations and press conferences held to call for that stoppage of the EC’s decision to compile a new voters’ register for the 2020 general elections.
IPRNA
The Inter-Party Resistance Against a New Voters’ Register (IPRNA) over the past two weeks has hit the streets of Kumasi and Tamale to demonstrate against the Electoral Commission of Ghana (EC).
IPRNA is mainly made up of opposition parties including; National Democratic Congress (NDC), All People’s Congress (APC) and People’s National Convention (PNC).
CSOs
Eighteen CSOs have also registered their opposition to the decision of the EC to compile a new voter’s register.
They said if there was the need for the collection of fresh data on citizens, “the more appropriate, most lawful and financially responsible and justified approach will be to let the National Identification Authority (NIA) collect and process the information”.
After that, it said, the NIA would then send the EC the subset of the information is needed for the purpose of elections.
Support
On the other side, 13 political parties have thrown their weight behind the decision to compile a new register.
In the estimation of the parties, the EC had made a solid case for a new register in terms of cost, time and credibility, hence their decision to support the commission to compile the new register.
By: Joseph Nii Ankrah. Twitter: @niiocanta
