Threatening delegates to return vote-buying money criminal – Tanko

A private legal practitioner and lecturer with the Ghana Institute of Journalism, Musa Tanko says no delegate owes any candidate the obligation to return monies or articles offered to buy their votes.

His comment comes on the back of the incidents of alleged vote-buying in the just ended Parliamentary Primaries of the New Patriotic Party.

There have been widespread complaints from delegates in Kumawu and Ejisu in the Ashanti region about failed candidates employing thugs to go after people they perceived not to have voted for them; after receiving overtures.

Speaking to Ultimate News Lawyer Musa Tanko argued: “if we are engaging in a contract, I give you something, you do something for me and if I haven’t done it, there is a breach of contract and that should be a civil matter.

“But in this instance, the object of the contract might be argued to be illegal. The other thing is that if the person is threatening to take his money, then the issue of the threat is a criminal matter as well,” he insisted.

Lawyer Tanko, however, warned that vote-buying will continue to fester if the state does not show enough political will to allow the law to take its full course against politicians engaged in such conduct.

“When you look at our electoral laws, our criminal code and the whole issue about corruption and bribery, it falls within that context but it is about the enforcement, “he averred.