Sunyani Municipality experiences low turnout in voters' register exhibition

Biometric voters’ register exhibition officials in some parts of the Sunyani Municipality on Monday, expressed concern about low turnout of residents in the exercise.

The 10-day exercise, which begun on Saturday, September 1, will end on Monday, September 10, this year.

It is a constitutional requirement in every election year for the electorate to check their names and particulars that appeared in the voters’ register.

Some of the exhibition officials attributed the slow turnout to low publicity on the exercise by the Electoral Commission (EC) while others said it was due to apathy on the part of the electorate.

This came to light when the Ghana News Agency (GNA) visited some exhibition centres in the municipality to acquaint itself with the exercise.

At the Abesim Dominase White House centre A and B, Mr. Jude Osei-Poku, exhibition officer, said out of the 1,250 provisional voters on document, only 74 of them had checked their names since the exercise begun.

GNA observed that only agents from the New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the National Democratic Congress (NDC) were observing the exercise at almost all the centres visited.

Queues usually associated with registration of people and voting were also absent with exhibition officers relaxing at the centres.

At the Saint James SHS centre at Abesim, which registered 903 people, only 45 of them had verified their derails since the exercise commenced three days ago.

Mr. Yaw Yeboah, exhibition officer, called on the EC to intensify education on the exercise.

At the Sunyani Nyamaa JSS centre ‘A’, out of the 819 registered people, 73 had checked their names and at centre ‘B’ out of the 810 registered people, 63 had checked their names since the exercise started.

Registration officials said there were no anomalies at the centres and the party agents were cooperating with them.

At the at Berlin Top centre, 182 voters had so far checked their names since last Saturday.

At the Sunyani Urban Council A and B Boys School, the turn out has been encouraging according to Ms Abigail Twumasiwaa Kusi, Exhibition officer in-charge.

She said 201 persons checked their names out of the 1,837 people who registered when the exercise started on Saturday.

Ms Kusi said on Sunday, four people realised that their names were misspelled and one person wanted to change his name but could not provide affidavit to support it.

She appealed to registered persons to check their names and other details to ensure a successful exhibition.

At the Fiapre Roman Catholic Primary and Junior High School centre, 264 people had checked their names since Saturday.

MS Erica Agyei Sakyiwaa, Exhibition officer, also called on Ghanaians to check their names to accelerate the exercise.

GNA observed that all exhibition materials were available at all the centres.

The situation was not different at the Techiman North and Techiman South Constituencies when the GNA visited some centres.

Mr. Samuel Dotokwaa, Techiman Municipal Electoral Officer, said the turnout was not encouraging after visiting 74 exhibition centres in the northern part and 120 centres in the southern part.

He said at Kofoso, Srapukrom and Apostolic Church Mayanka centres, some registered persons did not find their names on the register.

Mr. Dotokwaa said no electoral or exhibition officer had been intimidated since the exercise took off.

He said more than 40,000 people registered during the biometric registration exercise in the Techiman North and 90,000 registered in the Techiman South Constituencies.