Mr. Stephen Opoku-Mensah, Western Regional Director of Electoral Commission (EC), on Monday said almost the 1,200 prison inmates supposed to undergo the biometric registration exercise in the region “are not ready”.

He added that aside the fact that some inmates were not Ghanaians, most of them did not possess the requisite identification material to register.

Mr. Opoku-Mensah told the Ghana News Agency in a telephone interview that information gathered from prison authorities within the region also confirmed that most inmates were not ready adding, “We cannot bend the laws, we will go on and register those who meet the requirements”.

The biometric exercise for prison inmates in the region would be undertaken at the various prisons at Ekuasi, Central, Female, Tarkwa and Hiawa.

He said six officers would man each of the five centres and called on political parties to send their agents to the various centres.

Mr. Opoku-Mensah added that the biometric registration exercise would start at 0800 hours and end at 1600 hours according to prison regulation.**