Director of Elections of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) Elvis Afriyie Ankrah fears the country portends chaos and confusion if the Electoral Commission, Ghana (EC) defies his party’s concerns and goes ahead with the compilation of a new register for the December 7 polls.
According to Mr Afriyie Ankrah, even the coronavirus cases will blow out of proportion if the EC mounts registration centres across the nation to compile a new register.
He was addressing journalists at the NDC headquarters in Accra on Thursday, May 21, reiterating the party’s stern opposition to the EC’s decision.
Exactly last week, the National Chairman of the NDC, Samuel Ofosu Ampofo, accused the EC of colluding with the National Identification Authority (NIA) and the New Patriotic Party (NPP) to rig the December 7 elections for President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.
He claims the restriction of the basic required documents for a possible new register to the NIA card and the National Passport is a scheme to disenfranchise most Ghanaians, particularly members of the NDC.
Though the NIA and EC have denied this claim, Mr Afriyie Ankrah told journalists that the two bodies are still in cahoots with the ruling party to have Mr Akufo-Addo re-elected.
“We stand by our position that the current voters’ register is credible and that the country does not need a new voters’ register for this year’s general elections,” the NDC Director of Elections insisted.
“We are therefore employing all legitimate means to stop the needless, illogical and wistful new voters’ register agenda of the Jean Mensa-led EC.”
‘Grand conspiracy’
He noted that the use of the Ghana Cards and the passports as the only required documents for registration “are too narrow and wholly inadequate for the purposes of identifying eligible voters”.
To this end, he indicated: “This we see as part of a grand conspiracy between the EC, NIA and the ruling NPP to disenfranchise over 10 million eligible voters mostly in NDC strongholds.”
The EC originally scheduled April 18 to start the compilation of the new registere but for the outbreak of coronavirus in Ghana.
It has now scheduled June to carry out the exercise and has already rolled out fliers outlining the safety measures to be put in place at the various registration centres both for the registration officers and the registrants.
But Mr Afriyie Ankrah warned: “We foresee a situation where if they attempt to do it, first of all, it’s going to be very chaotic, there will be confusion all across the country and, secondly, God forbid if they persist, the Covid-19 cases are going to blow out of proportion.”
“We don’t want any of these things to happen. And when we talk they say we are calling for….Somebody was telling them that these are the things that happened in other countries and that led to chaos and instability and they say we should report to the police.”
The former Youth and Sports Minister said the NDC do not want to see the days of curfew and suchlike, that is why they want to speak out.
By Emmanuel Kwame Amoh|3news.com|Ghana