The Coalition of Domestic Election Observers (CODEO), says it will be a bit too harsh to accuse the Electoral Commission of being ill-prepared for the November General elections without giving them a fair hearing to know their challenges.
The Executive Director of the Institute of Economic Affairs, IEA, Jean Mensah, earlier told Citi News that Ghana is not ready for the upcoming polls since according to her, the EC had not yet rolled out some vital programmes such as the sensitization of voters on the process.
According to Jean Mensa, although the EC has put out its timetable for the election, it has not yet touched on programmes that are essential for running a successful election.
“I’m not hearing of voter education, the dialogue seems to be among the political leadership, those who are in charge of managing and running the elections,” she complained.
Butthe National Coordinator for CODEO, Albert Arhin, who’s a former employee of the EC, says it may be unfair to draw such conclusions particularly when there might be some financial constraints and other challenges that are hampering the commission’s work.
“Let us not judge quickly the actions of the Electoral Commission to mean they are not prepared because from the experience that I have and some things that I know with the Commission, every event has its own publicity and things that go with it.”
“First of all, have we even bothered to find out whether they have funding for the whole exercise?What I know is that, the Commission around this time or maybe in the period of Charlotte’s history now, monies are not released at a go to the Commission, it comes in tranches. If you are doing registration, government gives you money for registration, then again you submit another budget for exhibition and so on so we need to be very careful”Mr. Arhin explained.
He was however quick to remind the EC to work within the limited time period to ensure that the election is successfully conducted. He agreed with the IEA’s concerns particularly on the seeming delay in the commencement of voter education.
“Of course they [EC] need to hurry because they have only eight months to go. Normally we use to have about ten months or eight months to prepare, but this time around we are short by the months but we should not panic. I believe by now we are putting things in place, putting procurement procedures in order, ordering things here and there and then of course come out as a big bang.”
By: www.dailyviewgh.com
