Registration Runoff Sekondi

There were no queues at registration centres GNA visited on Monday in Sekondi and Takoradi a few minutes to the end of Voters' Registration Exercise Among the centres visited were Cassava Farm; Cape Coast Station Annex; Old Accra Station; PWD Park; Well Road; Lands Commission Secretariat; STC Station, and Dankessim. Officers at the centres were seen idling about as there was no work for them to do, while others had started packing the electoral materials. Mr Nathaniel Osiban, Registration Officer in-charge of Cassava Farm, said since the exercise began, they had not experienced any problems or shortage of materials and therefore, said there was no need to extend the exercise. Mr King Addai-Darkwa, Deputy Western Regional Director of EC, said the Voters' Registration Exercise had been a success in the Region because all eligible voters who showed up at the registration centres had been registered.

Speaking in an interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in Sekondi, he said the Commission had not done anything to disenfranchise anybody as all those who cared to register had done so. Mr Addai-Darkwa said there were no incidence of misunderstanding between political party agents at any of the 2,239 registration centres in the Region, they rather showed a lot of understanding and cooperation with the EC in resolving organisational issues. He said the registration officers also performed creditably despite the initial problems, especially with their remuneration.

Mr Addai-Darkwa said more than 600,000 voters were registered in the Region at the end of the first week. He said the EC organised operational teams to register sick people at the various public and private hospitals in the country as a form of special dispensation for the sick. He said the registration of eligible sick people would end on Thursday April 1. Mr. Addai-Darkwa said the sick would be registered under the registration centr nearest to the hospitals they are on admission and when they go to their places of residence after their discharge from the hospitals, they could arrange to have their votes transferred.