EC told to delete ‘NHIS voters’ quickly

Given that Ghanaians are very emotional when it comes to elections, the Electoral Commission (EC) of Ghana must hurriedly implement the Supreme Court’s order to delete names of persons who registered using the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) card as a proof of identification, Kwame Jantuah, a member of the Convention Peoples Party (CPP) has said.

The EC on Friday, July 8 announced that it has taken steps to implement the order given by the apex court. The electoral body in a statement signed by Georgina Opoku Amankwaa, Deputy Chair, Corporate Services, said: “The Electoral Commission welcomes the specific directives given by the Supreme Court on Tuesday, July 05, 2016 regarding those who registered as voters in 2012 using the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) cards as evidence of their citizenship.”

“The Court was very clear in stating that its order supersedes the relevant provisions of the Public Elections (Registration of Voters) Regulations, 2016 (C.I 91).This essentially means the commission is now empowered to delete such names ,while ensuring that they are not disenfranchised. The Commission welcomes this new development which will help the EC and all stakeholders to ensure a clean and credible register ahead of the elections.

“The Commission is taking appropriate steps to comply with the Court’s directives and would make same public in the coming week.”

But speaking on local television station, TV3, Saturday July 9, Mr Jantuah said: “Deletion of names should be an ongoing process as far as the EC is concerned because every year, we have underage voters, every year the EC will come [to IPAC] and show us a list of young people…so the deletion should be an ongoing process.”

He added: “Now that the Supreme Court has clarified, the EC should go ahead and execute this thing as quickly as possible. If it so happens that Parliament passes the law that we are holding the elections on November 7, we don’t want the EC to be the one that delays us.”

“It is an institution that everybody in this country is connected to. Elections are an emotive thing in this country, and in any country, especially where Africa is concerned. People are attached to it and so anything you do, especially where the Electoral Commission is concerned, make sure that you follow the laws and guidelines.”