Election 2008 Run-Off: The Issues And The Critical Questions

The New Patriotic Party (NPP) raised fundamental objection on votes from the Volta region in the December 28 2008 presidential run-off on the basis that there were anomalies with the voting process in the region. The party particularly has made claims that: the tenets of democratic voting were not adhered to in the Volta region during the December 28 2008 presidential run-off. The party contended that its agents were barred, manhandled and worst of all; the voting process was not allowed to be free, fair and credible.

On the basis of these claims, the NPP had qualm with the EC on final national results of the 2008 presidential run-off. The party tried to back its claims with hefty effort of demonstrating to the world that they indeed have a case. News conferences have been held, multimedia information and materials have been put –out, tales have been told all to support its claims. In one of these, Ms Elizabeth Ohene said and I quote “in every village and every community I went to give food to our agents, my car was surrounded by a hostile crowd which demanded to search my car because it suspected I had come with stuffed ballot boxes which I was going to use and replace those at their polling stations. I think these were well planned and thought through acts which were perpetuated by our opponents the NDC”… end of quote.

Immediately, my thought aroused an interesting question. Is the honorable Elizabeth Ohene saying she went to her party’s agents in the polling stations of the villages and the communities? If her assertion is true, then it exposes the NPP of the claim that it did not have agents in most polling stations in the constituencies of the Volta region.

Now on the NPP’s claim that its agents were manhandled in the Volta region, let’s ask why this was allowed by the security agencies charged with the responsibility of seeing to proper conduct of the polls. The NPP was the party in government then; the party whose appointees were in-charge of security in the districts and the region as a whole. The NPP’s appointees were heads of district security councils and the regional Security Council aptly supported by the regional police commander Mr. Dery. It is puzzling that these appointees could not enforce law and order in their jurisdiction the way it was done in other regions. Was it by negligence or incompetence on the parts of the officials? Well, I leave that to your candid judgment.

But the real issue is that the NPP’s claim of intimidation, bar and prevention of its agents in the Volta region during the December 28 2008 presidential run-off call for more answers to oblivious questions. In the run up to the run-off, the Volta region was laden with heavy security personnel- military, police and active border patrol teams; making the region the safest and by cogent the most law-abiding; law-abiding because in the multitude of security personnel there is obedience. The NPP’s claims that there was lawlessness and disorder during the day of voting in the safest and most subservient region confound many discerning Ghanaians.

Let come to the figures and the statistics. The Volta region recorded a turnout of 73.11%, the third highest below Ashanti and Northern regions for December 28 2008 run-off. The Ashanti region, where the NDC raised issues with votes from certain of its constituencies, recorded an unprecedented voter turnout of 83.31%: the highest in the nation. Interestingly, Ashanti recorded the second lowest rejected ballot- 12259 (0.63%). The NDC raised issues with votes from some constituencies in the Ashanti region on the basis that those constituencies had inexplicable abnormal turnouts. It was reported that some constituencies had as high as 140% turnout- a case in question is Sekyere. The NDC however, fell short of backing their claims with evidence.

In the light of all of these claims, I wish to subject results from these two contentious regions to the spot-light for you my reader. The NPP obtained 102,173 valid votes from the Volta region and the NDC had 630,899 valid votes from this same region. The NPP had 1,438,820 valid votes from the Ashanti region while the NDC had 479,749 valid votes from this same region. The NDC benefited in the Volta region with over 520,000 votes. The NPP also benefited in the Ashanti region with over 950,000 votes. Comparing the excess votes gotten by both NPP and NDC in these contentious regions, it is intriguing which of these two parties should “cry” or even if “cry” cry louder. I would leave this question to you.

In the meanwhile, the dust seam to be settling and it look as if we are now moving forward. My humble appeal to both parties is that they should leave the sleeping dogs to go ahead and lie. I urge the ‘wagging’ tongues like Kweku Baaku, Keneth Kuranchie and others to pull their breaks so we all lend our support to Atta Mills’ government so collectively we move Ghana forward.

By Mawutorli Nyarko mawuutroli@yahoo.com The author of this article is a Nuclear Scientist