Ensure contestants live in communities - EC urged

Accra, Dec. 12, GNA - An aspiring Assembly Member for the Nmlitsa Gonno Electoral Area, in the Ashiedu Keteke Sub-metropolitan Area of Accra, Mr Abdul Aziz Nii Ayi Tagoe, has called on the Electoral Commission (EC) to ensure that aspirants in the District Assembly Elections live in the areas they are contesting.

Speaking to the Ghana News Agency in Accra on Saturday, he said some of the aspirants in the elections had lied under oath about their residence, in contravention of the District Assembly Elections regulation, which required aspirants to be residents of the Electoral Areas in which they were standing.

He said about five of the contestants in the Nmlitsa Gonno Electoral Area were not residents of the community and urged the EC to ensure that they respected the electoral clause on residence. Mr Ayi Tagoe said he was born; bred and resides in the electoral area, which was carved out of the former Kinka Electoral Area as a result of the recent realignment of some electoral areas. He described the area, in the heart of the Central Business District of the capital, as a fishing community, where the people were struggling to get out of the poverty cycle.

The Assembly aspirant, who is the Accra Central Zone "A" District Commissioner of the Ghana Scout Movement, said as a trained social worker, he decided to help the community by introducing income generating ventures for the unemployed youth in the area. He mentioned a Non-Formal Education Classes for the elderly and part time classes in English and Arabic, at the Atukpai Central Mosque, for school children in the areas well as organizing regular clean up exercises to ensure good sanitation in the community as some of the initiatives he had started.

The Assembly aspirant said education was the bedrock for development and that, as a voluntary teacher, he would organize part time classes for members of the community and lobby the business community in the area, including banks and financial institutions, to sponsor the education of brilliant but needy school children and students, if he was given the mandate to represent the people as their Assembly Member. He said he would promote the formation of co-operatives for traders in the Central Business District, including the Makola Market, and encourage active interest in community development. Mr Ayi Tagoe said he would organize what he called "Community Parliament" for opinion leaders and Unit Committee members to disseminate the activities and decisions of the Assembly to the people, as a way of social mobilization to promote development. 12 Dec. 10