Group worried about continuous postponement of elections

Civil Society Organisations, (CSOs) Platform on Good Governance in the Northern Region has expressed worry about the continuous postponement of the district assembly elections.

The group observed that the trend was responsible for the voter apathy in the previous elections and appealed to the Electoral Commission (EC) to communicate the date for the District Level Elections as well as the time table for the whole electioneering process publicly.

Mr Alhassan Mohammed Awal, Platform Coordinator, in an interview with the Ghana News Agency, on Monday, in Tamale said, “It is worrisome to observe the continuous dwindling voter turn-out in district assembly elections".

“It is important to better enrich the bottom-up decentralized system of governance,” it said.

He said in the 2010 elections, the EC postponed eight out of 10 regions’ election dates five times, before conducting the elections in five different months, which ended in February, 2011.

“This trend has trickled down to 2014 where, as at October, 2014, the election date has been postponed three times from October to December and now January, with possibilities of further delays as no official communication for these postponements has been provided,” he said.

The Coordinator urged the EC to partner with the media and other institutions to increase education on the tentative date for the election.

He urged the government to release resources to the EC for the conduct of the local elections.