44% of Ghanaians think EC won't be transparent on election day - CDD report

A pre-election survey conducted by the Centre for Democratic Development has shown that 44 percent of Ghanaians sampled, believe the Electoral Commission will not act in transparency in the upcoming polls.

The development comes after the Centre in a 2016 survey, revealed some 23 percent of Ghanaians projected that the Commission will not be transparent in its conduct for the period

Director of Advocacy and Policy Engagement, Dr Kojo Asante, during an interaction with journalists after the launch of the survey on Friday October 31, 2020 explained, that per the findings, “44 percent said that even if the results are collated, the right result will not be announced by the Electoral Commission”

He added, “We saw that also in 2016 which was about 23 percent and this has actually gone up four years later which suggests to us that there is still a lack of understanding of the electoral process and the transparency surrounding the process”

Dr Kojo Asante said the findings must be a signal to the National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE) to conduct further awareness creation on the electoral process and its management body.

Ghana will on December 7 2020 go to the polls to elect a President and Members of Parliament for various constituencies as part of four-year constitutional mandate.

Initiated in 2016, the CDD-Ghana pre-election survey was aimed at picking early warning signals by tracking citizens' opinion on the overall level of the country’s preparedness for elections; public confidence in the competence, integrity and neutrality of the election-relevant state and quasi-state bodies; and voter behaviour, expectations, priorities and potential turn-out.