Voters register: Soldiers deployed to Volta to intimidate residents – Minority

The Minority in Parliament has accused government of using soldiers to intimidate residents of the Volta region as the Electoral Commission readies to compile a new voters register for the December polls next week.

According to the Minority, the sudden deployment of military personnel to parts of the Volta region is to ensure that the residents feel threatened to come out and register to vote in the elections.

Residents in the Ketu South Municipality of the Volta region say they are living in fear and panic following the deployment of some heavily armed security personnel into the area.

“There is this erroneous perception that every Voltarian who lives or works in Togo is not a Ghanaian. The truth is that some are dual citizens and they have the legal basis to vote as accepted under our laws,” the Minority Spokesperson on Security James Agalga told Starr News Friday.

He stressed: “The real reason why they have deployed the soldiers there is to intimidate them and to ensure that they don’t exercise their constitutional rights of registering to vote in the polls”.

He said the Volta regional minister’s claim that the military deployment is to ensure that residents from neighbouring do enter the country with COVID-19 is untenable because Ghana has more cases than Togo and others.

Background:

Residents in the Ketu South Municipality of the Volta region say they are living in fear and panic following the deployment of some heavily armed security personnel into the area.

The security contingent which includes the military and officials of the Ghana Immigration Service has been deployed into some communities along the Ghana-Togo boarder such as Wudoaba, Korpeyia and Anoenu since Monday 22, June.

According to residents, the presence of the security personnel is intimidating and puts them in fear, preventing them from going about their daily activities with comfort.

“We only woke up some two days ago and started seeing these men who are heavily built and are heavily armed in the community. We feel uncomfortable having them around because they are strange faces,” a resident of Wudoaba told Starr News’ Faisel Abdul-Iddrisu.

Another resident, Desmond said, “It feels unsafe and terrible seeing these heavily built military officers around our communities. We are living in fear and can not go about our daily lives as usual.”

He laments that “it is very intimidating when these men stop you along the way to question and search you in some cases.”

Some other residents are accusing the security personnel of invading their homes to search and question them, while some say the military have taken over market places thus creating fear and panic.

Meanwhile, the MCE for the area, Elliot Edem Agbenorwu in a statement this evening, justified the presence of the security.

He said, “The presence of the security in Ketu South is to protect the citizenry and to maintain peace, law and order in the municipality.”

He added that “As you are already aware, Ghana’s land borders have been closed since the outbreak of COVID-19, in order to curb the spread.

However, intelligence has it that a number of people still use unapproved routes to enter the country.”

In effect, the MCE noted that “They are here to also help police our porous borders and numerous unapproved routes against foreigners who still find way in the country through our enclaves.”