Tamale South lawmaker, Haruna Iddrisu, has intimated that Ghana’s democracy, after over three decades of the Fourth Republic, has come a long way to be subjected to the things being done by the Electoral Commission (EC).
He says the indulgence in any act by the EC that will potentially affect the outcome of the December presidential and parliamentary elections will not be countenanced by Ghanaians.
This, the former Minority Leader in Parliament, has asked the Chairperson of the Commission, to desist from her “holier than though” attitude and conduct the forensic audit the National Democratic Congress and other political parties are demanding.
“Today, we all cherish our peace, we want to preserve our peace, we want to preserve the integrity of the elections, safeguard our democracy, we are celebrating 30 years of it. We do not want acts or conduct, omissions or commissions that will soil the outcome of the December 7th presidential and parliamentary elections that can spell doom for the peace and tranquility of the Ghana we love and the Ghana we so cherish,” he charged.
Adding to his contributions on Hot Issues on TV3 Sunday, September 22, 2024, the legislator indicated that more advanced democracies such as the United States are conducting audit of their electoral roll and cannot understand why Jean Mensa is being adamant to the calls for an audit of Ghana’s.
According to him, the Commission becomes irrelevant, once it refuses to do what is expected of it regarding the elections.
“Just go to the US, either in Alaska or in Arizona today, there’s a correction of about 100,000 voters on an electoral roll in America. So what is this holier-than-thou feeling or persona that the Chairperson of the Electoral Commission seem to be manifesting or want to manifest?
“My strongest view, an Electoral Commission is only relevant to the extent that it serves the Ghanaian electorate and political parties well. You are irrelevant if you cannot serve the citizens well,” he stated.
The National Democratic Congress (NDC) on Tuesday, September 17, 2024 hit the streets across all the regions in the country and presented a petition to the EC’s regional offices demanding for a forensic audit of the voters’ roll.
The NDC had said that the integrity of the roll had been compromised, having detected some illegal transfer of voters from one constituency to the other without the knowledge of the persons involved.
After presenting its evidence to the EC, the Commission told the NDC that the errors have all been rectified.
Meanwhile, the NDC is asking the Commission to involve a third party to conduct a forensic audit, saying there are more illegal transfers, amid the EC’s refusal to provide evidence of what it claims it has corrected after the attention was drawn to the anomalies.
I defended Afari-Gyan’s appointment as EC Chair when NUGS kicked against him in 1992 – Appiah-Kubi
