General News of Tuesday, 10 September 2013

Source: peacefmonline

Afari-Gyan must resign - Ken Kuranchie

Managing Editor of the Daily Searchlight, Ken Kuranchie, has called on the Chairman of the Electoral Commission (EC), Dr. Kwadwo Afari-Gyan, to resign from his post for failing to uphold the credibility of the Commission.

Making inference from the revelations by Dr. Afari-Gyan during the election petition, Ken Kuranchie was of a strong view that the EC Chair had undermined the electoral system in the nation.

Speaking on Oman FM, he called for major changes in the Electoral Commission, averring that “in any Western country, any proper democracy; Afari-Gyan would have resigned before this came to an end…”

He together with the Director of Research Monitoring and Evaluation of the electoral commission, “Amadu Sulley and the people who were in charge of the last elections should clean up and get out of there, so that we see somebody with a little bit of integrity is fit into the place; so that we can go forward…We are fed up with people like Amadu Sulley and Afari-Gyan; people who will undermine themselves for their own personal interests and put all of us at risk,” Ken Kuranchie stressed.

He also questioned the basis for the President of the nine Supreme Court Justices, Justice William Atuguba, to propose that there should be reforms in the electoral system in order to avert any possible breaches of the laws governing elections in the country.

To him, it doesn’t lie in the bosom of the Judges to make such an appeal.

“Why should Justice Atuguba or any of the nine Lordships spend their time thinking about reforms for Ghana’s election?” he queried and sarcastically expressed that in reference to the court ruling the nation “held elections without any problem occurring. There was no double registration. There was no problem with the register…Everything was correct on the pink sheets. We’ve voted and John Mahama has won, so why suggest reforms for us?”

Suggesting a way forward to improve the electoral system, Ken Kuranchie said the Commission should make available an electoral calendar comprising the time schedules for registration and end of registration together with other vital information, which should spell out the guiding principles of elections.