A glitch in the biometric verification machine has caused officials of the Electoral Commission at a polling station in Damongo in the proposed Savannah Region, to manually verify voters in the ongoing referendum on the creation of new regions.
At the Town Park Polling Center, voters were verified manually due to a hitch in the verification machine which according to the presiding officer, Alex Kumatey, caused a bit of delay in the voting process which was supposed to begin at exactly 7:00am Thursday.
As at 8:13am, about 37 voters had already gone through the process.
“So far, the voting has been very smooth even though we are facing a little challenge which is a normal thing with the verification machine. Sometimes you have to try for about three times before it verifies,” Kumatey told our correspondent.
At the Ndewura-Jakpa polling stations A and B, a total of 61 and 45 voters had cast their cote respectively.
Voting is taking place in 17 polling centers are in the Damongo Constituency
About 65 police officers have been deployed to ensure safety at all the polling stations.
Meanwhile voting in parts of the Western, Northern, Volta and the Brong Ahafo regions where the referendum is taking place has been peaceful.
Six regions, Ahafo, Bono East, Oti, Western North, Savannah and North East are expected to be created if 50% of registered voters in each of these regions cast their votes, and more than 80% ‘Yes’ vote is required for the regions to be created.
Creation of proposed region
In 2017 some traditional and opinion leaders petitioned President Akufo-Addo on assumption of office to create new regions, citing among others underdevelopment as the basis for the need regions.
According to the petitioners, the creation of these new regions will create room for development and infrastructure distribution to reach all quarters across the country.
Consequent to the petition, the President constituted a Commission of Inquiry collate views on the proposal after which the Commission recommended to the government to proceed with the creation of the new regions.
The EC was then given the go ahead to hold a referendum for the people of in the proposed regions to decide whether the regions should be created.
Despite the expression of misgivings about the creation of the new regions and legal action, the road was cleared for the EC to conduct the referendum on December 27.
By 3news.com| Ghana