Calls For Voters’ Register Audit: Afari Gyan Set a Precedence, Follow It – IDEG Boss Urges EC

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Dr. Emmanuel Akwetey, the Executive Director of the Institute for Democratic Governance (IDEG), has said there is precedence to the calls being made by the opposition NDC over the voters’ register.

He says the National Democratic Congress (NDC), whilst in opposition in 2008, made a similar call when it raised suspicions over a bloated roll in the Ashanti region, necessitating an audit by the then Chair of the EC, Dr. Kwadwo Afari Gyan.

According to the IDEG boss, some State institutions including the Ghana Audit Service, joined the independent audit firm that was contracted at the time, and submitted a report which was appreciated by all factions.

Dr. Akwetey, is therefore calling for a third party intervention for the forensic audit the NDC is demanding from the EC, for a peaceful electoral process.

Speaking on Ghana Tonight on TV3 Monday, September 16, 2024, Dr. Akwetey noted that it will be prudent to let precedence guide recent developments.

“There has been a precedent under Dr. Afari Gyan and what he did eventually was to invite experts from outside the Commission to go through the register. There was a private accounting firm, government side, the Audit Service and other institutions came together and they went through these processes.

“That was 2008 elections, again, it was NDC in opposition and fighting to come to power and they solved problems with the data, initially Kumasi, [it said the register was] over-bloated and secondly they raised issues across. Eventually they did that and it helped us to go through the elections relatively peacefully.

“So, it’s not something they haven’t done, there is precedent and the Commission taps into a wealth of strategies and approaches to getting its work done to the cheers of everybody. So, we felt that where mistrust is so deep and they cannot bilaterally resolve the issue, [they should] get a third party. Because in the case of 2008, when the independent group came out with the results, both of them looked forward,” Dr. Akwetey advised.

The opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) is today, Tuesday, September 17, 2024, staging a demonstration against the EC for its failure to heed to the party’s call to conduct a forensic audit on the voters’ register.

The protest, dubbed; Enough is Enough, according to the NDC, is to submit their petition to the offices of the EC across all the 16 regions on what it wants the Commission to do sanitise the voters’ register.