NDC, NPP solutions can’t guarantee credibility – IDEG

The chairman of the Institute for Democratic Governance (IDEG), Dr Emmanuel Akwetey, has asserted that it is almost impossible to cleanse an already infested voters' register when political parties flout election laws with “so much impunity and arrogance”.

However, he agreed some credibility has to be ascribed to the register.

At a stakeholders’ forum on the voters' register on Thursday, the main opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) pushed for a new register while the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) was against it, saying the register can be cleansed.

NDC General Secretary Johnson Asiedu Nketia stated that NDC’s position proposes “the current biometric register must be maintained and tradition and conventions of cleaning up the register employed to ensure that the register is credible”.

But Dr. Akwetey in his presentation at the forum said neither the NPP nor the NDC’s solutions can resolve the inconsistencies in the voters’ register as quickly and effectively.

“The NPP’s solution is probably too hasty because it throws away the rich data found in the biometric register. NDC’s solution is difficult to stand by.”

He proposed a drastic “surgical” approach to dealing with the matter.

“IDEG believes that just as there are surgical procedures to cure a problem in the body, there are procedures to use to cure problems with Ghana’s register.

"So like laser, surgery or amputations are all options to cure health problems, there are ways to adopt to solve the voters’ register question,” he stated.