EC accused of deliberately filtering presidential aspirants with huge filing fee

Progressive People’s Party (PPP) has said the GH¢100,000 filing set by the Electoral Commission for presidential candidates is an attempt to exclude some aspirants from the race.

PPP National Chairman, Nana Ofori Owusu, said the EC has deliberately set the huge filing fee as a stringent measure to keep from others from contesting.

“They have set up stumbling blocks for others who mean well to want to contribute to the political discourse. And the fairness and the equity of our nation demands that this thing that the Electoral Commission has put there must be removed because it is not the best approved for filtering out people.

“The Constitution does not say you must have big money to want to run for president, the constitution only talks of 40 years and of a sound mind. So where are these impediments being put in the way to disallow people wanting to exercise their franchise,” he said on Citi News.

The EC on Monday, September 15, 2020, announced that presidential candidates are required to pay GH¢100,000 as filing fees while parliamentary candidates pay an amount of GH¢10,000 to enable them to partake in the upcoming elections.

The Commission instructed that the monies be paid through a banker’s draft.

Both the presidential and parliamentary aspirants are to file their nomination from October 5 to 9.

Just after the announcement, some smaller political parties and individuals complained bitterly about the pricing and are calling on the Commission to take a second look at the decision taken.

Law professor, Kwaku Asare, popularly known as Kwaku Azar, is among a section of Ghanaians who have spoken out against the fee.

In a related development, however, Political Scientist Prof Ransford Gyampo has backed the Electoral Commission’s decision on the filing fees.

He insisted that individuals aspiring to occupy leadership positions in the country should be fundraisers.