Tain youth reject flashpoint tag

The Tain constituency in the Brong Ahafo Region has never been a violence-prone area, hence the classification by the Electoral Commission (EC) of the area as a flashpoint ahead of this year’s presidential and parliamentary polls is “misleading”, “frivolous” and “unfounded”, youth of the town have said.

The EC has identified 81 constituencies out of the 275, including Tain, as possible hotspots for this year’s elections.

The Chairperson of the EC, Mrs Charlotte Osei, who announced this, said the EC had started a project, together with the Ghana Police Service, to map out all the polling stations in the country, especially those in the flashpoints, to ensure adequate security at all polling centres and the EC’s regional offices.

Speaking at a national colloquium on the security of the upcoming general elections at the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping and Training Centre at Teshie near Accra a few days ago, she urged political leaders to take responsibility for the actions of their supporters to ensure a peaceful and transparent general election on December 7.

But a statement co-signed by Nana Yaw Boampong, Osei Yaw Seth, and Mensah Kwadwo, spokespersons for the youth of Tain, said the area “has never seen any election-related violence ever, so this tagging has raised worrying brows to us the youth and the entire people of the district, for the peace of our constituency being downgraded to a potential trouble area”. “This phenomenon sees us, the youth of Tain constituency especially, as lawless and violent youth, which in fact is a frivolous and unfounded claim by the EC.”

“We are, however, aware of some electoral fraud that was perpetrated in the constituency in the 2008 and 2012 elections, yet none of these resulted in violence. So, why this time? We are calling on the [chair of the] Electoral Commission to come out again and tell us the criteria she used in selecting and branding Tain as a violent constituency. We have been able to promote peace in the eyes of the EC, while lacking electoral justice in our area.”

The statement added: “Tagging our constituency as violent, we believe, will subsequently, unreasonably and unjustifiably, retard development in our area, which we totally disagree [with], and, therefore, refute. We are, hereby, believing that the EC is trying to use the police to intimidate and cow us so that the NDC can easily commit electoral fraud during the 2016 elections and, thereby, traduce that as violence-free and uphold that to the best of peace. Once again, we are calling on the Electoral Commission to come out clear on this so as to remove the fear and panic it has brought on the good people of Tain.”