Sack EC deputy Returning Officer for demanding bribe – Wasipe Youth

The Concern Youths of Wasipe (Daboya) in the North Gonja District of the Savannah Region have petitioned the District Director of the Electoral Commission (EC) for the North Gonja District to remove the deputy Returning Officer (RO) for the district Mr Issaka Muniru because of his alleged persistent demand and taking of money from his colleague temporal workers of the electoral commission anytime there is an exercise.

A statement issued by a group called the Concern Youths of Wasipe and signed by all the executives which was copied to Bole based Nkilgi Fm said Mr Issaka Muniru popularly called Teacher Bii has over the period of his engagement as deputy returning officer of the North Gonja District always been showing some kind of misconducts anytime the commission carries out any exercise in the district”.

They stated further, “Mr Issaka Muniru most of the time deliberately shorten the number of electoral officers to be recruited for a polling station or a centre. This is what he always does during elections, limited registration and exhibition and for instance, during the exhibition of the limited registration exercise, he assigned one Mr. Issahaku Abubakari to work in three different centres single handedly and that is Donkompe, Wawato and Gurbagu”.

The Concern Youths of Wasipe again said, “Another bizarre behaviour of Mr. Issaka Muniru is his persistent demand and taken of money from his colleague temporal workers of the electoral commission anytime there is an exercise.

The Concern Youths of Wasipe cited an example that “during the 2018 referendum to create the new regions all those who worked as temporal officers were made to pay an amount of GHc20.00 to him (Mr Issaka Muniru) after taken their allowances” and that as if this was not enough during the last District Assembly elections, he again demanded to take GHc 30.00 from each worker”.

The Concern Youths of Wasipe alleged Mr Issaka Muniru only rescinded the decision after some two courageous people decided to report him to the Electoral Commissuon District Director in 2019.

“He (Mr Issaka Muniru) always use his position as a returning officer to threathen people who in one way or the other have a personal disagreement with him. For example, Mr Fuseini Abdul Rauf who had a disagreement with him on personal grounds got rejected by him when he applied for a registration officer in this ongoing registration exercise as he earlier made a promise to him during their disagreement. Another typical example is one Mr Dari Braimah who also picked a challenge with him when he the returning officer to some unlawful money from him during the payment of the exhibition exercise. During the time of this challenge, he openly told Mr Braimah that, next time he will never be recruited for any temporal exercise of the commission. Low and behold. It really happened during this registration exercise; the group alleged.

According to the group; “We cannot allow an individual, based on his or selfish gains to come and put the good name of our district into public ridicule. We are therefore appealing to your good office to critically look into these our concerns and address them appropriately”.