The National Election Security Taskforce, led by the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Dr George Akuffo Dampare, on Monday, this week, met with the Electoral Commission of Ghana to take stock of their collaboration, as well as plan ahead.
So far, the Electoral Commission of Ghana (EC) finds the collaboration between the two sides as effective, particularly with the protection services for recent voter registration exercises.
Mrs. Jean Mensa, Chair of the Electoral Commission, described the collaboration as fruitful and thanked the IGP and his cohorts for the wonderful work done.
She thanked the security agencies for their cooperation, adding that unlike the past exercises that were marred by many incidents of violence and conflict, this time, there was only few pockets of incident, “which we effectively nipped in the bud.”
Mrs Mensa indicated that the Commission’s readiness to deliver credible and peaceful election to the country. She further assured the security taskforce that the Commission would ensure transparent, fair and peaceful elections this year.
The Chair used the occasion to inform the populace that from August 1 to 3, 2024, the Commission would organise a mop up registration exercise to offer opportunity to citizens who have turned 18 after May 29 to the register.
The mop up exercise will be followed by the voter register exhibition exercise from August 20 to 27 as well as offering of a short code that voters can conveniently use to verify their registration details from their phones at a fee of GHp30.
And if there are any mistakes with the registration details, the voters are to visit EC offices across the country, particularly the district where they registered to effect the changes.
She said the voter register exhibition exercise would be conducted in all 38,622 polling stations across the country. The EC chair added that the various exercises held by the Commission had been very successful and was grateful of their support.
She said, “We held the registration in all our 260 district offices including the newly created Guan district offices. We also held registration in 7,075 difficult to access Electoral areas as well as 25 public universities.
As a result of the robust methodology and arrangements put in place, we were able to bring on board a great number of people interested and eligible Ghanaians who were keen to register and as we speak, we haven’t received one complaint from eligible citizen who was keen to register, but was unable to do so.”
Mrs. Mensa also indicated that they her outfit was pleased with the arrangements that were put in place and commended the EC staff, both permanent and temporary, for the excellent job done.
Dr. Dampare stated that those handful incidents are being dealt with, saying”even though there were 1,2, 3 instances…the fortunate thing is that those behind them have been arrested and a few of them we are still pursuing and some of them are being prosecuted.”
As Chair of the National Security Taskforce, he said they have sole responsibility to ensure that there is peace, security, law and order in their activities during this election period.
He commended the EC for an excellent job done and cooperation and partnership that they have had on all the recent activities.
Furthermore, the meeting was an opportunity for the two sides to sit down and debrief to look at the issues that came to their attention that needed to be handled better going forward.
The meeting was also to confirm EC upcoming activities and implant with the necessary security strategy.
IGP Dampare said through this close cooperation, the various exercises such as the voter registration, compilation of special voting, and transfer of voters were successful.
The IGP added that with the continued cooperation with the EC, the journey ahead of them would be far better than the previous and reminded the electorates that Ghana is the only country that they have, therefore, they contribute to maintaining its peace.
