Afari-Gyan assesses progress of local gov't elections

Ho (Volta Region) ---- Dr Kwadwo Afari-Gyan, Chairman of the Electoral Commission (EC), on Tuesday stated that voter apathy in the last District Assembly elections was due to the failure of the public to appreciate the developmental impact of the Assemblies and not because of lack of adequate education.

He made this point at a Volta regional forum on the institutional and legal framework of the district level elections, organised by the EC and sponsored by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) in Ho.

Dr Afari-Gyan said the election figures showed that response from urban and metropolitan areas where publicity and public education were higher, the turnout was lower than in the rural areas.

He explained that the encouraging turnout in the rural areas was because the people felt the direct impact of the activities of local government unlike those in the urban and metropolitan areas where all developmental activities were attributed to the central government.

He, therefore, advised District and Metropolitan Assemblies to popularise their activities to get the public to appreciate their efforts. Dr Afari-Gyan observed that the low response to local government elections "may well be a worldwide phenomenon since elections are very costly, and a low turnout always entails a lot of waste, because calculations are always based on the assumption that every registered voter will come and vote".

He called for a thorough analysis of the phenomenon in Ghana with the view to addressing it, rather than finding an easy escape through partisan advocacy.

Dr Afari-Gyan said the "laws prohibiting partisan interference in the elections must be enforced with co-operation from all citizens rather than citing such partisan meddling as reason for making the elections partisan". He said major issues to tackle should include the demarcation and the number of electoral areas and units.

The mounting of platforms, printing of ballot papers, dispassionate assessment of the non-partisanship of the elections and adequate funding for institutions involved in local governance should also be examined, he added.

Obeng Busia, Special Assistant to the Minister of Local Government and Rural Development, said the laws governing local government arrangements should be simplified so as to remove ambiguities in the minds of those affected by such laws.

Kwasi Owusu-Yeboa, Volta Regional Minister implored Parliamentarians not to ignore the decisions of the District assemblies even though they were not binding on them. He said it was important that periodic assessments were carried out on institutions to determine whether they were performing their functions as expected.