Johnson Asiedu Nketiah says he is expectant of an IPAC meeting where the EC will shamefully expose its gross incompetence in organising the limited registration exercise nationwide.
The Electoral Commission’s (EC) nationwide two months’ limited registration exercise climaxed yesterday July 7, 2019, with legions of shortfalls and grave complaints by most Ghanaians and prospective voters, who had to go through thick and thin to get registered.
First timers who wanted to acquire a valid voter’s ID had to join a queue as early as 12:00am, with some sleeping at the registration centres, which the EC created at its district head offices.
The inconveniences characterised by the decision by the EC included the daily cost of transportation, fatigue, stress, suspicion and heightened the tension as the opposition parties held that the move by the EC was a deliberate attempt to disenfranchise the first time prospective voters from getting a voter’s ID card.
As at the time of drawing the curtain down on the exercise Sunday July 7, thousands of Ghanaians were still in snaky queues at the various centres, according to reports from correspondents of the various radio and TV stations.
Tensions, furthermore, were high as the correspondents reported that the applicants who could not have their turn to get registered cursed the EC for denying them their rights.
Others requested an extension of the exercise by the EC, a clarion call the other opposition political parties have also added their voices.
The fallout, which was foreseen and pointed out by the opposition political parties especially the National Democratic Congress (NDC), was rubbished by the EC, with its Deputy Commissioner Dr Bossman describing the NDC as an apology to Ghana’s democracy.
In an interview with Johnson Asiedu Nketiah, General Secretary of the NDC, Monday, he said the action by the EC was a planned confusion to disenfranchise majority of the prospective voters.
Citing wrong equipment, wrong registration processes, wrong guesswork and deliberate decision to reduce registration centres were deliberate actions by the EC to deny first-timers from voting in the 2020 general
elections.
Known in Ghana’s political circles as ‘General Mosquito’, Mr Nketiah wondered the expenditure of the huge parliamentary budgetary allocation to the EC for the just ended exercise, and “the dead silence by the loud civil society organisations in the NDC administration is injurious to our growing democracy.
“But, some of us will continue to point out the ills in the incompetencies of the EC, who will soon come out to pride itself of carrying out a successful limited registration exercise.
“We in the NDC are patiently waiting for the EC to convene an IPAC to assess its bad work and expose its shame,” Asiedu Nketiah said.
Story by Umar Sheriff / awakenewsonline.com