Ghana’s Electoral Commission Works to Make Upcoming Polls Transparent | Voice of America - English
Ghana's Electoral Commission (EC) says it's put structures in place to ensure transparency in the voting on December 7, when Ghanaians go to the polls to elect a new president and 230 new members parliament. The Electoral Commission is mandated by the Constitution to conduct elections in Ghana.
"We used to have boxes which were opaque. We now usetransparent boxes. Voting also takes place in the open. We involve thepolitical parties in the printing of ballot papers. We get them involved inwhatever we do at the printing houses," he says. Getting all the parties involved is a way of building trust andopenness in the activities of the EC. Members of the political parties belongto a body known as an Inter Party Advisory Committee, IPAC. Since its formationin 1994, IPAC has helped develop a code of ethics for political parties tofollow during election periods. It also influenced the adoption of optical markreaders, scanning devices that can read pencil marks on ballot papers. Thenumber of those read by the scanner will be matched later against those in theballot boxes. If a ballot box has extra ballots, fraud can be suspected. But the voter register isalleged to be bloated, including more voters than exist in the country. Arhinattributed this to statistical error and double registration by some people: "In theregistration that we did recently, people who had their names on the registerbut have lost their cards came and registered again. People were bringing inminors because they thought that numbers [would give their vote added weight]during elections. We are now compiling the names of those who registered [morethan once], and we are preparing to send their names to the police forprosecution," Arhin said. An estimated 12.5 million voters are expected to cast theirballots on Dec. 7. Arhin is confidentthat enough provisions have been made to forestall any shortage of ballotpapers. Provisions have also been made for any run-offs. While parliamentariansare elected by simple majority, the top two presidential candidates face arun-off if no one gains more than 50 % of the votes cast in the first round. Arhin said counting of votes starts at the polling stationsbefore the public to help allay fears about swapping or stuffing of ballotboxes [before they are] transported to constituency counting centers: "The public is invited to the counting. We don't go and hide in a roomto count and come and paste the results for people to see. If a ballot is indispute, the people are there to see, and we give details of the results to thecandidates at the polling station. By this we are saying that integrity startsfrom there and ends at the headquarters of the commission," he says. Thereare 16 registered parties in Ghana. Arhin said eight are taking part in thepresidential election and 12 in the parliamentary election.