We’ll deliver on December 7 – Electoral Commission

The Electoral Commission (EC) of Ghana has overcome every challenge associated with the conduct of elections over the years, and is poised to deliver the elections on 7 December this year, Mr Eric Dzakpasu, Public Relations Director of the Electoral Commission, has said.

According to him, the election management body is focused on implementing measures to ensure that this year’s elections and subsequent ones are free and fair.

His comments come at a time the director of elections for the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP), Mr Martin Adjei-Mensah Korsah, has said the EC does not have its act together for the elections, a situation which may have resulted in parliament rejecting a proposed change of the poll date from December 7 to the first Monday of November in every election year.

Mr Korsah said: “The Commission doesn’t have its act together. It’s not enough to come and tell us that you are ready when indeed you are not. Everything seems to be disorganised. If they eat humble pie, get down to work and stop the talking, they should be able to overcome it. If you have difficulties and you don’t let people know, you are not going to get help. There is so much talking and very little being done.

“I am not surprised by what happened in parliament. The Electoral Commission has failed to demonstrate its preparedness to hold this election some months away from now. We have never gone into an election where we are so close [to the date] and the primary document of the election, the voters’ register, has been embroiled in some kind of controversy which does not appear to have any end in sight,” he said.

“Even though we are supposed to be going through an exhibition process, there are too many problems. There are too many problems again with this NHIS brouhaha and people who have never had NHIS cards have found their names on the list. It’s almost leading to chaos all over the place.

“The EC ought to have done certain activities but they’ve changed over and over, they keep shifting. It was obvious that with what was going on in parliament, very objective, well-meaning MPs who wish this country well would not want to see us go into any problems with our elections.”

But speaking in an interview with Prince Minkah, host of the Executive Breakfast Show (EBS) on Class91.3FM Friday July 22, Mr Dzakpasu said: “We (EC) have assured that we are going to deliver. I will rather wish that we put aside [the matter of the rejection of the proposed date] and focus on the exhibition”. “What challenges are we not overcoming? We were in the Supreme Court,… as soon as the ruling came out that: ‘EC, delete according to applicable law’…we came out with the list…we are deleting and reregistering. We will deliver the elections on the 7th of December."