Voter registration gets encouraging start

Wa, July 31, GNA - Many of the registration centres in the Wa Municipality recorded an encouraging turn out when registration of newly qualified voters began on Thursday.

Long queues could be seen in some of the centres as scores of youth who had reached the voting age waited patiently to have their particulars processed.

When the Ghana News Agency (GNA) visited the Kambale Islamic School registration centre at 1000 hours, 22 people had registered while about 60 others lined up and waited for their turn. A similar scenario was recorded at the Saint Andrew Junior Secondary School centre in the Konta Electoral Area where 20 people had registered at 1030 hours while 42 others were waiting to register. At the Wa Central Mosque centre, 22 people became registered voters as at 1130 hours while 34 others waited for their turn. It was only at the Regional Directorate of Health Services (RDHS) registration centre that the new voters were coming in trickles. There, the People's National Convention (PNC) agent was challenged by his New Patriotic Party (NPP) counterpart for not having accreditation but the registration officer allowed him to continue with the exercise while the agent took steps to produce the document. While the National Democratic Congress (NDC) had three agents in each of the centres the GNA visited, the NPP and the PNC had agents in only the RDHS centre. The other political parties had no single agent in any of the centres.

Mr Yahaya Mahama, Upper West Regional Director of the Electoral Commission said 396 registration officers have been engaged to undertake the exercise in 99 out of the 198 electoral areas in the region. He added that the exercise has taken off smoothly in all the centres and he was not anticipating any major challenges in the eleven-day exercise.