I have to trust EC to conduct credible polls – Nana Addo

The Presidential Candidate of the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP), Nana Akufo-Addo, is holding on to the hope that the Electoral Commission will deliver on its mandate of free, fair and credible elections on December 7.

The months leading up to the December 7 elections, have seen the Electoral Commission (EC) dominate the news cycle for mostly the wrong reasons; ranging from the protracted attempts to get the Commission to clean the electoral roll, to the disqualification of some presidential aspirants, and recently the handling of the special voting exercise, that ended with thousands of security personnel fearing they had been disenfranchised.

Responding to questions on his belief in the EC’s ability to effectively organise the polls on Citi TV’s Politicos, Nana Akufo-Addo simply said, “I have to, because I am committed to the process.”

That was in response to a direct question as to whether he trusts the EC to conduct credible polls.

Nana Akufo-Addo noted that he was going to buy into the EC Chairperson, Charlotte Osei’s verbal commitment to ensuring a fair electoral process.

“She [Mrs. Osei], has made a public commitment to that effect, that she is going to deliver the best-organised election in our history. I want to believe her and I have to believe her.”

The NPP Flagbearer however stressed that, his hope in the EC’s ability to conduct credible polls stretched beyond the personality steering the Commission as he said, “I don’t believe in her [Mrs. Osei]. I believe in the institution; the Electoral Commission. It is an important institution in our country and all of us are required to give it our best possible support.”

We must pray EC’s arrangements are satisfactory

He also lauded the EC’s decision to extend the special voting exercise, with the hope that the hitches brought on by “special circumstances” would not extend to the voting process on December 7.

The EC on Thursday announced that it would allow the thousands of security and media personnel nationwide, who were unable to vote in Thursday’s limited registration exercise to do so on Sunday.

The personnel were turned away because their names were not on the special voting register in the constituencies they thought they had registered in.

But Nana Akufo-Addo’s plea to Ghanaians is that, “our prayer must be that, whatever the difficulties were in Thursday’s vote… it is not going to be witnessed on Wednesday. We have to hope that things are well organised because if the same level of chaos is to happen on Wednesday, then the country has serious problems.”

“I believe the wish of the Ghanaian people in their overwhelming numbers is to have an incident free, fair, transparent process on Wednesday, so that their voice can be properly articulated and heard. All of us must be on our knees in prayer that the arrangements that the Electoral Commission has put in place are going to be satisfactory arrangements on Wednesday,” Nana Akufo-Addo stated.