Election 2020: Greater Accra has highest voter population

The Greater Accra Region has the highest valid voter population for the 2020 presidential and parliamentary elections.

Out of the total 17,029,971 valid voters on the Register, the Region has 3,529,181, followed closely by Ashanti Region, with 3020,141 voters.

Dr Bossman Eric Asare, the Deputy Chairman in charge of Corporate Services at the Electoral Commission (EC), disclosed this in response to a question posed by Members of Parliament at the weekend.

Members of the Commission were invited by the Leadership of Parliament to brief the House on the Commission's preparedness for the 2020 election.

Present at the briefing were Mrs Jean Mensa, the Chairperson of the EC, Mr Samuel Tettey, Deputy Chair of Operations, Mr Kye Duodo, the Procurement Officer, and Mr Henry Ashong, the Deputy Finance Director.

Dr Asare said the Eastern Region had the third-highest with 1,641,215, voters followed by the Central Region with 1,568,352 and Western Region, 1,187,566 valid voters.

The rest are Western North - 468,683, Volta -924,117, Oti - 358,552, Bono - 653,609, Ahafo - 316,938 and Bono East - 594,617.

The Savannah Region has 298,402, Northern, 1,050,015, North East, 289,535, Upper East, 659,309 and Upper West, 469,739.

He said the exceptional list had a total of 14,002 persons while the multiple lists had 18,619 persons.

Mrs Jean Mensa said the printing of the 2020 Voters’ Register was underway and assured that it would be completed and distributed well in time for the elections.

She said a soft copy of the register had been made available to all political parties.

Printing of ballots was on-going at seven printing houses in Accra, namely; the Buck Press Ltd, Assembly Press, Fonstat Ltd, Innolink, Yasarko Ltd, Checkpoint Ltd, and Acts Commercial Ltd, she said.

Mrs Mensa said to ensure transparency, agents of all political parties and security officers were monitoring the processes at the printing houses.

The printing of the Results Collation Sheet for Presidential and Parliamentary Elections, also known as the “Pink Sheets,” commenced on Sunday, November 8, she said.

The EC Chairperson said the Commission had recruited 233,632 temporary officials made up of returning officers and their deputies, presiding officers, verification officers, name reference officers as well as a COVID-19 ambassador for the exercise.

The EC Boss said a comprehensive training programme had been drawn for each category of officials and that they would be equipped with the requisite skills to enable them to perform excellently.