If a new voter registration exercise is done, what worst could happen? - Atik quizzes

General Secretary of the People’s National Convention (PNC), Atik Mohammed, has punched holes in the argument of the Interparty Resistance Against the New Voters’ Register (IPRANVR).

According to him, issues raised against the Electoral Commission (ECs) decision to compile a new voters’ register cannot be sustainable as the IPRANVR keep shifting the goal-posts.

Speaking on Okay FM’s "Ade Akye Abia" Morning Show, Atik Mohammed accused the coalition against the new register of "deliberate misunderstanding" of the ECs position.

“This is deliberate misunderstanding and I call it deliberate because they know it is not like that but they are deliberately misunderstanding the position or the explanation of the EC in respect of the date for the release of the register to political parties,” he averred.

He explained that the November 8 date which the Electoral Commission (EC) mentioned is rather the date for the EC to print their registers and distribute them to their district offices for the conduct of the 2020 general election and not the date on which the political parties will receive their registers.

“We will receive our register in mid-October and then after that nomination will be opened and so it cannot be true that the registers will be ready on November 8 as the Interparty Resistance against the new voters’ register run out to lie to the public to make their unfounded case,".

The PNC General Secretary wondered what could be the likely repercussion, as being bandied about by the National Democratic Congress (NDC)-led IPRANVR, should the Electoral Commission compile a new voters register for the 2020 general elections in the country.

“The basic question I have been asking is that if we embark on a new registration exercise what is the worst that can happen?” he quizzed.

“...nothing will happen except that we will have a reliable, sustainable, technology-supported register; that is the only thing that will happen,” he added.