Vote buying allegations: NDC to hand over offenders to police

The National Democratic Congress (NDC) has not officially received complaints from any aspirant about vote-buying in the just ended parliamentary primaries.

According to the party, it has also not seen any evidence suggesting there was vote buying.

It urged caution in interpreting allegations of vote-buying on social media as facts and called for circumspection.

Complaints of voting buying

National Communication Officer of NDC, Sammy Gyamfi, however, indicated the party has taken note of the few media complaints by some aspirants that their co-contestants engaged in vote-buying during the process.

“Am talking of Ras Mubarak, Victoria Hamah and some constituents at the Awutu Senya East Constituency”

Sammy Gyamfi who was speaking on Newsfile, Joy News’ Saturday analysis programme, stated though the NDC is not officially seized with the matter and has not seen any evidence to support the allegations, it has launched an investigation to unravel the truth.

He said, “Because we do not proscribe to vote buying to support corruption in elections, at the just ended Functional Executive Committee meeting of the party last week, it was directed that these people be invited to meet the Committee on Tuesday.”

“Then we can ascertain the veracity of those claims; whether it is true that these things happened in the three constituencies or it is just a matter of sour grapes.

Proof of vote buying

Sammy Gyamfi acknowledged that though proving allegations of vote buying could be difficult it could be done.

He argued if the phenomenon was pervasive as is being alleged then it could even be easier to prove because there are ways of proving allegations.

Sanctions against offenders

He stated that as a party, the NDC will take punitive actions against any aspirant proven to have engaged in this abhorred behaviour.

According to him, the party after its action will refer such aspirants to the security agencies for further probe and prosecution.

“You know that some of the aggrieved aspirants themselves have lodged complaints with the Bureau of National Investigation (BNI).”

“We will not prevent that process from going on as a political party,” he said.

“As a political party we are interested in the matter that is why even though they have not lodged official complaints we have gone out of our way to invite them to ascertain the truth.”

The NDC Communicator argued there is also possibility of people losing the primaries and throwing out false allegations. http://Volta former MPs want post-primaries skirmishes resolved

The party, he said, has demonstrated its commitment to ascertain the veracity of the allegations and pledged it will not brush them aside.