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Press Release
NPP
No: NPP00500
January 14, 2016
RESPONSE OF THE NPP TO THE
EC ON THE REQUEST FOR A NEW VOTERS’ REGISTER
DELIVERED BY PETER MAC MANU AT THE NATIONAL HEADQUARTERS,
ASYLUM DOWN
Ladies and gentlemen of the media, we thank you for
responding in your numbers to our call this morning and
would like to take this opportunity to once again wish you a
Happy New Year.
As you know, the Electoral Commission has predictably come
out to say an emphatic no to the option of compiling a new,
credible biometric register of voters for the 2016 general
elections. We say predictably because until August last
year, the Electoral Commission and the ruling party agreed
publicly on one thing, that there was absolutely nothing
wrong with the existing electoral roll. Even after the new
EC boss took office, it was made clear to Ghanaians, through
the EC’s PRO, Mr. Christian Owusu Parry, that, “The
Commission’s position remains the same. It has not changed.”
Indeed, to the EC the register was “very, very credible and
fit to be used for any election in this country.” - See more
at: http://www.myjoyonline.com/politics/2015/July-23rd/voter-register-credible-no-need-for-new-register-ec-insists.php#sthash.Dc5a0OhF.dpuf
The EC’s predetermined position was reflected in its
decision to put up a timetable of events and actions which
had no room for a New Register. It is therefore clear that
all the EC has been doing is trying to find reasons to
justify its already determined position.
What is interesting, ladies and gentlemen, is that when you
read the two reports, both the Electoral Commission and the
VCRAC Crabbe Panel have come to agree with the NPP position
that the current register is bloated. Not only that, they
both agree, the Panel more forcefully than the EC, that the
existing procedures in place cannot be relied on to clean up
the bloated register. In other words, the EC agrees with the
NPP that the current register is incurably flawed and not
fit for purpose. Let me point out that the evidence of these
admissions can be found in the EC’s own detailed response to
the NPP, which is published on its website, and the Panel
Report, which we have a copy here.
To the Commission, the register is bloated for two main
reasons: (1) too many dead people on the list; (2) the Voter
ID serves as a national ID card for everybody in Ghana,
including foreigners, minors and, presumably, fraudsters who
need multiple identities to commit fraud.
It is useful at this juncture to make this point: the EC has
not been able to challenge any of the statistics we provided
to show the register as bloated.
They have used all manner of phrases and excuses to dance
around it. When all is said and done, the EC is now saying
it agrees with us that, yes, Ghana has a bloated register.
That is the bottom line. However, instead of fixing it, what
we are getting from the Commission are excuses upon excuses.
For example, the EC wants us to merely accept its assertions
that it is not as good as its counterparts in other African
countries at cleaning up a bloated register.
Let me quote exactly what the EC says at Page 9 of its
response to the NPP:
“The reasons for Ghana’s relatively high score are:
1. Processes for challenging registration of prospective
voters in other jurisdictions are more effective.
2. The Voter ID card is de-facto national ID card in Ghana,
hence the higher numbers due to enhanced demand for it as a
means of identification.
3. The existence of a compulsory national ID system in most
comparative countries.
4. No automatic linkages of voter registration to the Births
and Deaths Registry in Ghana, hence a high number of
deceased persons still on register.”
Ladies and gentlemen, these are the very words of the
Electoral Commission, not ours. In other words, the
Commission is saying to Ghanaians that, yes, our register is
among the worst in Africa; yes it is bloated. But, so long
as we don’t have a proper national ID card in Ghana; so long
as we don’t have proper records of the dead, we cannot
prevent illegal names from getting on to the electoral roll.
It is interesting to note that the NPP used Nigeria,
Senegal, Kenya and Tanzania in its analysis on this point.
Interestingly, the EC limited its response to only Kenya and
even added South Africa, which was not part of the NPPs
analysis. We will want to know which reasons the EC provides
for countries like Nigeria, which is only now rolling out a
National ID system for its populace. And yet, Nigeria’s
election management body was able to find an effective
method of getting a more credible register without a
national ID for its 2015 polls.
To the EC, “the current challenge procedures under CI 72” --
the law on registration -- “are sufficient…” This was the
position of the immediate past Chairman of the Electoral
Commission when the NPP and other political parties, notably
the CPP and PPP, demanded in May 2014 for a forensic audit
of the register. This position, to our disappointment,
appears not to have
changed much under his successor, EC Chair Charlotte Osei,
who still sees the challenge procedure during exhibition as
it.
But in fact, in fact, the EC’s own panel of experts
dismisses relying on the challenge procedure at the
exhibition stage as “not a viable option.” The Panel Report
at Page 17 paragraph 7 reads:
Judging by the sheer numbers, the Electoral Commission’s
proposition to display the register, with political parties,
the Electoral Commission and citizenry to identify and point
out invalid names, is not a viable approach. Particularly,
when the persons who identify these records are expected to
expend their time, energy and resources not only to provide
the evidence but also to testify before a court of competent
jurisdiction.
It continues at Page 18: “the system is not effective in
achieving the set goals of eliminating invalid records from
the register and must be reconsidered. It is said that you
cannot do the same thing and expect different results.”
Unless, of course, the EC is not keen on getting different
results in 2016.
STATUS OF VOTERS WHO USED NHIA CARDS AS PROOF OF
QUALIFICATION TO REGISTER:
In the “view of the EC”, the “Abu Ramadan ruling cannot be
the basis for the creation of a new register.”
For the NPP, the Supreme Court ruling is clear and it will
be totally illegal to allow voters whose Citizenship has
been called into question by the Highest Court of the land,
to remain unquestioned on the Voters’ Register and leave
them still eligible to vote in future elections.
The Electoral Commission is ultimately responsible for
ensuring the sanctity of our electoral system and ensuring
that only eligible voters participate in our elections. For
the Electoral Commission to insist on keeping on the
Register, voters whose citizenship is in doubt as a result
of the Ruling of the Supreme Court, only exposes the intent
of the Commission to completely forego its mandate and hide
behind all manner of excuses.
We must point out that nowhere in the Supreme Court verdict
on the Abu Ramadan case did the Court opine anywhere that it
will be fair and proper for all such persons to also be
heard prior to invalidation. The Supreme Court made no such
claim as the EC wants to force down on us.
The NPP’s view which was stated clearly in our Petition to
the EC has been that judging by the fact that many millions
of people on the Register used the NHIA card as proof of
citizenship, it would be logistically impossible to
scrutinize such registrants and judge whether they are
indeed eligible to be on the Register or not; and this is
one of the reasons we suggested the compilation of a new
Register. If the EC thinks that it is logistically possible,
they should immediately announce the steps and quickly roll
it out. Failure to do this, will only mean the obvious –
even though the current Register’s credibility has been
questioned by no less a body than the Supreme Court, the EC
is determined to keep the it, in order to give a particular
political party, an undue and unfair advantage.
It is the responsibility of the EC but no one else to adhere
to the Supreme Court decision and purge the register of all
such illegal entries before giving those who are eligible to
vote another opportunity to now register legally? If this is
not the basis for the creation of a new register then the EC
should tell us how many people registered with the NHIS
cards? How does it intend to identify every single one of
the estimated millions of Ghanaians who registered using
NHIS cards in 2012? The EC should again tell us, how it
intends to inform every single one of them to come forward
to take steps to regularise their voting status.
INDEPENDENT AUDITING OF BIOMETRIC VOTERS REGISTER:
This again shows how the EC is determined not to be
transparent or fair. The EC, together with whoever the NPP
does not know, hired a so-called consultant, failed to even
disclose the name of this consultant, what his track record
is and the nature of the work he had been tasked to do; the
NPP like all political parties we know of were kept in the
dark and the EC, which in this case could be the compromised
Party, hired someone; only for EC to turn around and ask
that we take the word of this unknown consultant as it came.
How is this possible? Why was the EC determined to hide the
consultant and the work he or she did? Why did the EC not
allow for observers from the Political Parties to work with
and observe the work of the consultant so everyone could
have accepted his or her report?
We have not yet seen the audit report so we cannot critique
what it says. Indeed, whiles the EC Chair was happily
announcing to the world that an audit of the BVR has been
done, the auditor himself was saying it would take three
months to do a proper audit. In his words, when he appeared
before the Panel at the EC office on November 17, 2015,
Ghana “must find means of addressing the underlying issues
of a bloated register” and that “In Kenya the auditing
process was completed within a period of three (3) months
and if that is exactly what the EC may consider, it should
not wait any longer.” To him the work that he was contracted
to do for the EC fell far short of the kind of audit the EC
needs.
The NPP wishes to serve notice to the EC that we will have
difficulties accepting the Consultant’s work as constituting
a credible, comprehensive, independent, competent and
conclusive audit of Ghana’s biometric voters’ register. What
will ordinarily suffice is an open, international tender for
a credible NIST (National Institute of Standards &
Technology) -certified AFIS info-system auditing expert to
undertake this important task and in the presence of
technical agents of all the political parties. The EC had no
reason to botch this one up, by rushing it behind the backs
of stakeholders, if it were genuinely interested in doing a
good job.
COMPROMISED EC DATABASE:
We brought evidence of alleged scanned pictures and double
and multiple registrations to show that the EC’s database
lacked the necessary integrity. The EC has come out strongly
to deny this, with a set of evidence of its own and by
relying on the work of its Consultant, which we have already
addressed and stated our difficulty with accepting his work
and word.
We find the response of the Commission on this finding
laughable and still stand by our evidence of, among others,
scanned pictures in the EC database and the fact that the
database is compromised.
The EC threw the photo evidence we highlighted back at us to
presumably stress the extent of our folly. We would not want
to spend too much time on this except to throw back at the
EC just one set of the fraud and seek further explanation on
it.
We picked up these two entries as another example of double
registration. The EC came back to say that the two photos
actually represent two different people and printed out two
sets of fingerprints in support. But, ladies and gentlemen,
let us re-examine these two faces properly. The forehead,
the eyes, the nose, the lips, the neck and facial
expression. What you notice is that the two are clearly of
the same person. But, there is a big difference: the person
is wearing a different shirt for each pose. These two
pictures are on a
PDF soft copy of the 2014 de-duplicated register which the
EC supplied to us recently.
Now, let’s look at the information provided. The Voter ID
numbers are different. The Polling Station is the same. Age
is the same. Full name is the same. Now, here it is. The
Registration Date for both is April 5, 2012, the same day.
Now take a closer look at the time of registration. For the
one on the left, it reads 5:15: 35 seconds. For the one on
the right it reads, 5:17:54 seconds. Thus, both were
registered two minutes apart. In other words the same person
was registered twice within two minutes. Now, what is even
curious is that the person managed within those two minutes
to change shirts!
How on earth was that possible? Was that in the full glare
of others who were registering as well or a person who has
access to the database did it in the quietude of some IT
room? This one example alone supports our case that the
integrity of the database has been compromised and can
therefore not be trusted. We will be happy to hear the
excuse the EC may come up with on this one.
76,000 TOGOLESE ON OUR REGISTER:
We are bemused to note the desperate attempt of our EC to
create credibility issues for the document used by the NPP
without any basis or any attempt to be fair to logic.
First of all, the EC claims it found it curious that even
though the NPP claimed that the Register it used was the
Register used during the Voters’ Register Exhibition in
Togo, the NPP Presented a soft copy to the EC when it
requested for it.
This is reminiscent of the theatrics of the EC exposed at
the Supreme Court and shows that nothing much has changed at
the EC since 2012; that they are desperate to aid the NDC in
their propaganda and; that after all, they still have a
basic challenge with IT or understanding it.
First of all, the EC should have realised that every hard
copy in today’s world was printed from a soft copy. So the
fact that a Register is used at an exhibition does not mean
there is no soft copy from which that was printed and that
the particular document comes in only Hard Copy.
Secondly, the process can also be reversed. Hard copies can
easily be transformed into soft copies. This basic knowledge
of IT is too elementary that we cannot find a possible
explanation for why the EC failed to get it. The only
explanation we can give is that the EC was bent on
discrediting the NPP in line with the NDC’s propagandist
claims on the bombshell dropped by the NPP. It is sad that
the EC will reduce itself to joining the propaganda wing of
the Ruling Party.
The other thing the EC did to try to raise credibility
issues for the NPP’s case was to raise the issue of the NPP
not updating the EC on the work it had done on the Togo
Register.
We find this attempt puzzling. First of all, it should be
recalled that this is not the first time the EC has
responded to the issue. The EC Chair, indeed, gave almost
the same response to the NPP at the Forum organized to
collate views on the matter.
The fact is, whether the NPP found a million or a 1,000
Togolese on the Register, the case was the same, that the
Register had been compromised and that there was a need for
a new one. It was precisely because of this reasoning that
the NPP did not ask for a cleaning of the 76,000 but asked
for a compilation of a totally new Register. It is as if the
NPP had asked for a cleaning of the 76,000 that a case can
be made for working for more names; but the evidence
presented and the request made was totally not dependent on
magnitude.
As expected, the fundamental reasons for the EC in denying
the request on this evidence, has nothing to do with numbers
but flawed general principles and understanding of the law –
these have nothing to do with magnitude. From the ECs
response, the reasons include:
a. That the NPP did not provide any proof of the citizenship
status of these persons and did not show any proof that they
were not entitled to be registered in Ghana.
b. That Registration on the register of another country,
under the current laws of Ghana, does not take away one’s
eligibility to be on the Ghanaian Register.
c. That Ghana’s Constitution permits dual nationality and
admits the possibility of acquiring citizenship through many
modes such as naturalization, adoption, and marriage. It
would therefore be improper and unconstitutional to simply
remove the names of persons on the register on the mere
allegation that they appear on the register of another
country without giving them the opportunity to provide proof
of their citizenship of Ghana.
d. That Seeking to remove names of persons who appear on the
registers of Togo, Burkina Faso and Cote d’Ivoire in our
view, would be an arbitrary and discriminatory application
of the law. And that would the Commission therefore be
required to obtain the registers of all countries of the
world and remove the names of persons who appear on such
registers as well as Ghana’s?
Can the EC tell us which of these reasons could have changed
if the NPP had provided it with more persons on both the
Togo and Ghana registers?
Now to the reasons:
The EC says, “In examining the identity and status of the
76,000 Togolese alleged to be on Ghana’s register, the EC
found that they were all duly registered during the mass
registration period in 2012.” It goes on to argue that,
“most of the voters were registered in districts in the
Volta and Northern Region… [Therefore] our conclusion from
this examination is that the voters are duly qualified under
the laws of Ghana to be on Ghana’s register.”
We find this statement to be both curious and needlessly
bold. First, the EC is saying it knows to be true that all
the 76,000 are Togolese. We agree. Then, it goes on to make
an unsubstantiated bold claim that all 76,000 are duly
certified Ghanaian citizens. We want the EC to come again on
this by showing us the methods it used to establish that
every one of the 76,000 is a Ghanaian national.
Again, for the EC to say that the NPP did not provide any
proof of the citizenship status of these persons is
mindboggling. The NPP could not have provided any proof of
citizenship status. It is the responsibility of the EC,
together with other state bodies, to crosscheck and confirm
the citizenship status of these persons who also appear in
the Register of Togo. What we expected and what should have
been done, was for the EC to have provided the documents and
evidence of their citizenship status which they provided
before they were registered and evidence/ documents on their
dual citizenship
in the event that the EC claims they are dual citizens. The
EC didn’t provide a single document on a single person,
unlike it sought to do on some other issues raised. So why
could the EC not go through its database to pull out the
proof of citizenship documents submitted by these 76,000
persons before they were registered?
The EC in another point states that Ghana approves of dual
citizenship and that it would be improper and
unconstitutional to remove names of persons found on
Registers of other countries without providing them the
opportunity to prove their citizenship. So the simple
question is, which opportunity did the EC create for the
persons in question to prove their citizenship? Is the EC
now choosing a path of assumptions rather than the facts and
what is? Why assume they could all be dual citizens (just
like the NDC claimed) when you have not been able to provide
any documents on their Dual Citizenship or failed to give
them an opportunity to proof? What led the EC to this
conclusion?
Again, the EC says that removing the names of Togolese
Voters on our Register will be discriminatory and arbitrary.
This is another unfortunate excuse and perhaps the worst
excuse. The EC is mandated to ensure the sanctity of our
voters register. How they do that job is entirely for them
to determine, if the EC thinks that by deleting names of
Togolese on our Register, it has to delete names of Japanese
on our Register, that is entirely the decision of the EC and
how they go about it is also entirely in their domain as
long as it is done fairly and transparently. But this excuse
is just like the saying that because the Police is unable to
arrest a thief in one part of the country, the Police will
be discriminating and acting arbitrarily if they arrest
another thief in another part of the country.
Ladies and Gentlemen, is it not strange that despite the
insistence of the NDC and the EC that all the 76,000 persons
whose identities are found on the Registers of the two
countries, are Ghanaians, not a single one of these 76,000
has come forward to challenge the findings and defend their
eligibility or say that they are not on the Togo Register?.
Not one. Very strange.
It must also be pointed out that the Togolese media
extensively published the revelation of the 76,000 Togolese
who had found themselves on the Ghana register and no denial
whatsoever came from any institution or person in Togo.
Let us say this again, we are exposing these facts not to
target any particular group of people. We are only doing so
to show how unscrupulous people in institutions of our
state, and, we believe, a political party, undermined the
sovereignty of the Ghanaian people by introducing ineligible
persons on our register to seek to manipulate elections. If
we all agree that elections in Ghana are not ECOWAS
elections then we must all be active in making sure that
only the people of Ghana elect the President of Ghana.
EC PANEL CONFIRMS REGISTER AS BLOATED:
As stated earlier, there is now no question that the current
register is unacceptably bloated. The Justice VCRAC Crabbe
Panel, which the EC itself commissioned, and which included
a renowned statistician, in its analyses, compared three key
indicators: estimated voter population, registered voters
and estimated deceased in voters’ register from 2010 to
2016. Its findings are that the number of names on the
voters’ register is unacceptably more than the total
estimate of people eligible to register to vote in Ghana.
The Panel Report, using data from both the EC and the Ghana
Statistical Service, is of no doubt that both the 2012
register and the current updated register (2014) are bloated
and flawed. It makes the case that even if Ghana was able to
achieve the statistical improbability of a 100 percent
registration of every eligible Ghanaian, the 2012 register
should not have exceeded 13,650,237 names. This figure is
nearly 14 percent smaller than the voters’ list used in 2012
and does not take into account those who registered
illegally using NHIS cards. Also, this was the register that
the EC itself admits now that the AFIS software was not good
enough to undertake any meaningful de-duplication in 2012.
The Panel was also unconvinced, among others, on the
suggestion that there is no perfect Register and that all
registers since 1992 have been bloated, as claimed by Dr.
Wereko-Brobbey. The Panel observed that, if true, this
rather strengthens the case for looking at the accuracy of
the register.
Thus, despite the EC’s strong claims publicly that the Panel
rejected the call for a New Register and suggestions that
the Panel had Okayed the current Register, the Panel found
that the Register was flawed and could not be the basis for
any election this year or in the future and suggested
various ways for rectifying the situation.
In the words of the Panel Report, “The other element of the
bloated register is the situation with the names of the
deceased remaining on the register. This, by far, appears to
be the most critical both in terms of magnitude and
copulative effect, and implications for the creditability of
the electoral process.” This is not the NPP talking. This is
the Panel put together by the EC.
The report makes the calculation and concludes, “Further
analysis of data, based on the reported number registered in
2012 and 2014, shows that as many as 584,892 estimated
number of voter deaths would have occurred cumulatively by
the 2016 elections and may well remain in the register of
voters.” What the Panel did was to isolate, first, the
number of the population who are 18 years and above, then,
reduce it by the number of foreigners, reduce it further by
the estimated number of dead people who were eligible to
vote, to come at the total estimate of people eligible to
register. Mind you, not even Australia, where voting is
compulsory, can boast of 100 percent voter registration.
We agree with the Panel’s view that having nearly 600,000
dead people on the 2016 register “is too wide a margin to
entertain.” This constitutes about 4 per cent of the
eligible voters on the register, which, again, in the words
of the Panel, is “too wide beyond the tolerance limit, given
that presidential elections are won by a much narrower
margin.” They have expressed concerns that the “human
factor”, as they put it, can, for example, lead to multiple
ballot papers being given to a single voter by an
unscrupulous election officer or results changed on paper
either at the polling station or collation centre.
CLEANING VERSUS REGISTERING ANEW:
The Panel Report makes it absolutely clear that the EC does
not have an effective system to restrain ineligible persons,
such as minors, foreigners and fraudsters, from being
registered. And even, when these sets of people get on the
EC does not have an effective means of getting rid of their
names. Again, there is also no effective means of removing
the name of dead people, as already admitted by the EC.
The Panel’s findings make a strong case for, what the report
terms as “validation”. The Panel proposes that all eligible
citizens who wish to remain registered voters must be made
to report to their polling stations to be validated by way
of both facial image and fingerprints biometrically
verified. Those who do not show up to have their voter
status validated, the report proposes, should not be
maintained on the register, in the same way that an eligible
voter who does not show for registration will not have his
or her name inserted into the list of voters.
Let me quote straight from the report for emphasis (Pp.
20,21):
It seems that doing nothing more than the usual updating and
waiting for the citizenry to pursue those who are illegally
registered, will engender the most bloated register, by the
mere fact that very few of the names of the dead are likely
to be brought up.
Generally, it might be difficult to justify leaving more
than half a million invalid records in the register that we
seek to characterize as credible. It may be expedient to try
to find a middle ground to creating a new register through a
completely new registration process. The Electoral
Commission could consider extending the exhibition exercise
to have voters confirm their names on the list, an
indication that they would want to maintain their voter
status.
The benefits include signaling that the Electoral Commission
is doing something about the known flaws in the register;
the more cost-effective approach is being used. In the same
way that a new registration would have required citizens to
physically appear for registration, the cleaning would
require that they appear to confirm. The major difference is
they spend less time because no forms are filled.
Rather than make others responsible for maintaining voters’
name on the list, the individuals should themselves do that.
This also avoids the issue of people looking for documents
to support any claim to get a record removed. This is
largely what happens with the current system of hoping
invalid names would be detected. It would be important to
use this opportunity to call on all who are not eligible to
voluntarily get their names off without facing any
prosecution.
Ladies and gentlemen, for the NPP, though the attempt by the
Panel to find a middle way is laudable, the best and most
viable option for dealing with the current incurably flawed
Register as seems to have been accepted by the EC, the Panel
and even the NDC which not long ago claimed the register
perfect, is for the compilation of a new Register with the
necessary laws and systems to ensure that the problems of
the past do not afflict it in the same way and for the EC to
reaffirm its commitment to principles of fairness,
transparency and integrity. For us this is the best and most
credible way to go. It will give all those who registered
using the NHIS cards an opportunity to register again and
legally this time, without the EC undertaking any extra work
of first identifying and isolating them and informing them
to come forward to regularize their voter status in a
complex manner. It would help remove all the ghost names,
and vigilant measures can be employed by both EC and party
agents to stop non-nationals who got on the list from
repeating that exercise. Finally, it will help in the
critical area of bringing back public confidence in the base
document that will be used for this year’s general election.
However, we do agree that the opinion of EC panel for a
validation exercise would be an acceptable and second best
approach to resolving the problem of ineligible voters on
Ghana’s voters’ Register.
RECENT COMMENTS:
Elitist Register
Over the weekend, the EC Chair granted an interview to Joy
FM, using it as an opportunity to respond to a number of
issues. Among others, the EC Chair stated that “if the
Commission listens to the NPP, it will end up with an
Elitist Register”.
We find this statement most unfortunate and again, another
indication of how the EC Chair is quick to jump on the NDC
propaganda bandwagon and be seen to be leading it.
The NPP’s recommendations for a New Register includes many
of the requirements that have been used in the past to
compile Voters’ Registers. We find it therefore strange that
the EC boss will claim that our recommendations will lead to
the creation of an Elitist Register. The NPP is of the view
that the EC boss must desist from projecting herself as
someone who speaks the same language with the ruling Party
and rather speak as a neutral and fair manager of our
Electoral Process.
Ongoing Cleaning of the Register
Again, the EC Chair disclosed in that interview that the EC
was currently undertaking a cleaning of the Register. She
made the bold statement that; “we (the EC) have identified
in Ashanti Region alone, 200,000 names which are on the
Multiple Registration List which we have to sit with the
Political Parties and clear”.
This disclosure is again very strange. The EC in its
response to the NPP claimed in page 23 that 150,000 names
had been identified as multiples nationwide. How is it
possible therefore for the EC to identify as much as 200,000
names in the Ashanti Region alone?
The NPP hereby serves notice that, it remains totally
dissatisfied with the response from the EC and reiterate its
conviction that only a new credible voter’s register will
guarantee us free, fair and transparent elections.
The NPP is by this response calling for an immediate stop to
all processes involved in the so-called internal cleaning of
the Register until all parties can satisfy themselves of the
modalities and means by which this so called internal
cleaning is being done.
The NPP hereby serves notice that, it remains totally
dissatisfied with the response from the EC and reiterate its
conviction that only a new credible voter’s register will
guarantee us free, fair and transparent elections.
In conclusion, the NPP wishes to thank all its rank and
file, the CPP, PPP, NDP, all other political parties,
including the one-half of the Ghana Freedom Party that
supported the case for a new register. Our special gratitude
to all the civil society groups, like the Let My Vote Count
Alliance, religious leadership, like the Christian Council,
the Catholic Bishops
Conference, the Muslim community, elder statesmen like
President John Jerry Rawlings and President John Agyekum
Kufuor, Nana Konadu Agyeman – Rawlings and, the many
ordinary people, both home and abroad, who prayed and worked
hard to make our voices heard. The battle is not over but we
are certainly making progress.
But, we do also have a special message for President John
Mahama and his NDC: with or without a new register, your
time is up; change is coming. The Ghanaian people cannot
wait to get rid of you with their votes. The Ghanaian people
are not prepared to have this year’s elections stolen from
them. The Ghanaian people are fed up with the eight years of
needless suffering under the NDC. Ghanaians have had enough
of your incompetence; your corruption and your deceit. They
have risen to the challenge for change. Ordinary Ghanaians,
students, teachers, nurses, bankers, carpenters, traders,
builders, drivers, doctors, fishermen, hairdressers,
tailors, farmers and the nation of unemployed youth out
there have all decided to take personal and collective
ownership of the change that is coming. Ghanaians are ready
to protect the ballot at their various polling stations and,
we, the NPP are steady and ready to lead the people on this
Charge for Change.
The collective wisdom of all these political parties,
religious bodies, former presidents and ordinary Ghanaians
should not be ignored by the Electoral Commission. The call
for a new register is not a party political matter but it is
an issue in the supreme interest of Ghana and all Ghanaians.
Let us all arise for change! Insha Allah the NPP shall win
the 2016 elections to save Ghana.
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