Editorial by Ghanaian Times: Make law work in all electoral processes!!

On Thursday, May 30, 2024, the Electoral Commission (EC) began the transfer of votes, the application for proxy voting, and the replacement of lost or damaged voter ID cards.

The exercise is scheduled to end on Friday, June 14, 2024, but it could be extended because of certain happenings around it.

For instance, just days after it started, it recorded violent incidents at some registration centres, usually clashes between agents of the two dominant parties in the country: the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP).

In the circumstances, an emergency Inter-party Advisory Committee (IPAC) meeting between the Electoral Commission and the political parties was called yesterday but ended inconclusively.

A careful read of our lead story gives the impression that the meeting ended that way because of the different positions taken by the NDC and the NPP on the matter.

The NDC thinks that should not be the case because the whole idea of the EC is intended to advance the electoral fortunes of the NPP.

Meanwhile, the NPP says that under the law, there is no room for party agents to observe the transfer of votes and application for proxy voting but the voter registration and that it was in the interest of transparency that the IPAC decided that party agents should serve the process, but if circumstances have called for a U-turn, then all stakeholders must abide and allow the process to proceed seamlessly.

It is a fact that democracy cannot eliminate political parties, but it appears members of political parties in the country are always in for their own interests.

The majority of the people have lost trust in politicians because they see how, through corruption, the politicians have made politics more lucrative than industry, such that politicians become richer than business people overnight.

There is suppressed anger among the people, and the only way to stop it from exploding is to change the status and allow the law in every aspect of public life in Ghana to work.

What does the law say about the transfer of votes and the application for proxy voting?

What does the law say about the EC and IPAC?

We remember no one but a former chairman of the EC, Dr. Kwadwo Afari-Gyan, telling the media and, for that matter, the entire world in Sep­tember 2021 that IPAC decisions cannot be binding on the EC as that would mean meddling with the independence of the Commission.

While we say this to sort of appeal to the NDC to reconsider its stance on the agent matter in the ongoing exercise, we do not rule out whatever fears they have.

We can only say that no party should foment trouble that can put the result of the 2024 presidential election in particular in disrepute and cause violence.

The EC must do well to erase any such suspicions and make the law work in all the electoral processes in the country.

This year’s election is going to be the most crucial so far because while the ruling NPP is sure of breaking the eight-year cycle of political power that has characterized the country’s Fourth Republic despite the performance of the ruling party, the NDC, accusing the NPP of unprecedented dismal performance for almost eight years, wishes to frustrate that enterprise and take power.