We won’t plunge Ghana into war – EC

The Deputy Chairperson of the Electoral Commission (EC) in charge of finance and administration, Ms. Georgina Opoku Amankwaa has assured Ghanaians that her outfit would not deliberately plan to plunge Ghana into chaos, as some of the citizens are thinking.

According to her, members of the EC are also Ghanaians and that should anything untoward happen in the country, they (EC officials) and their families are also going to bear the brunt, like any other Ghanaians.

She has therefore, called on Ghanaians who haboured such negative thinking that the EC officials had a plan to plunge the country into chaos to discard the notion.

The Deputy Commissioner was also not happy about the way people read all kinds of meaning into the administrative decisions that are taken by the commission and called on the public to stop interfering in the affairs of the commission and allow them to do their independent work.

Ms. Amankwaa was speaking at a day’s training workshop on the new C.191, which regulates registration of voters for women groups, members of the Federation of Ghana Society of the Blind, the physically challenged and the market women at sokode-lokoe in the ho municipality recently.

The EC’s Deputy Commissioner told the participants that this year’s general election would not be an ordinary one because the ruling party would like to retain power whilst the opposition parties are also working hard to wrestle power from the government.

She stressed that the EC would live up to its responsibilities and would do everything possible to ensure free and fair elections.

This, she noted, would be done by allowing eligible voters who have attained the voting age to register during the limited registration exercise.

According to the Deputy Commissioner of the EC, opportunity would be created for people to check their names in the voters register as well as inform the commission about relatives who has died since the last election for their names to be removed from the register.

Ms. Amankwaa stressed that these measures put in place would help clean the voters register by removing ghost names from the register.

She noted that officials from the EC would not be able to identify names of foreigners and minors on the register and that they needed the cooperation of the public who must pick the challenge forms to point out people they think should not be on the register.

She said the limited registration exercise would start on the 28th of April and end on the 8th of May, 2016, to ensure that people who have attained 18 years and above registered to vote and called for cooperation and support from the electorate to ensure success in the exercise.

The Volta Regional Director of the EC, Mr. Selormey Adukpo, explained that the workshop, which was sponsored by the USAID, aimed at educating the participants on the new C.191regulate the registration exercise of voters.

Mr. Adukpo explained that the criteria for people to register would include evidence as a citizen of Ghana, should be 18 years and above.

He said suspected under aged persons could be challenged at the registration center by filling a form without engaging in violent acts.