EC to insist on Ghana Card alone for voter registration CI

The Electoral Commission (EC) is to insist on Ghana Card alone as the only document for voter registration under the Constitutional Instru­ment (CI).

It explained that Parliament had not rejected the CI intended to achieve that but had only made proposals that were not binding on the Electoral Management Board.

“Although both sides of Parlia­ment expressed reservations with the CI before going on recess, processes for laying the document has not been totally gone through for the Bill to be laid, and claims Parliament has rejected the CI are untenable,” the Commission noted.

Dr Serebour Quaicoe, the Director of Electoral Services at EC, said the election management body would ensure the CI was brought before the House again so as not to disenfranchise all eligible voters however, the committee expressed qualms about scrapping of the guarantor system.

He indicated that it also objected to the Commission’s move to limit continuous registra­tion exercises to regional, district capitals and offices determined by EC however, observations of Parliament were proposal which the Commission was not bound by them.

“We are not bound by those proposals, we have been given a constitutional mandate, they have given us processes we can go through, all those preliminary procedures are issues supposed to be form of negotiations and I do not think they are binding on us.

“The only thing the Con­stitution has prescribed is, if Parliament do not agree, then the document should be laid and reject it, so any other issue is just proposal”, Dr Quaicoe said.

Before Parliament went on recess, Jean Mensa, Chairperson of EC, assured the House the CI was not for the compilation of a new voter register but was for continuous registration and not for new register.

She pointed out that under the limited voter registration processes, registration was conducted at limited periods and was not done all-year-round for such persons who turned 18 after registration period could not do so after the time set for limited registration, which usual­ly was within two to three weeks.

Mrs Mensa intimated that under the new CI, anyone who turns 18 could walk into any of EC’s district offices and regis­tered to vote which was depar­ture from previous one and advantage was potential voters could register anytime and any day.

She said eligible persons would be at liberty to do that at their leisure since it would be an all-year-round activity.