Ghana Card purchase: Govt must fund NIA — EC
In order to expedite the acquisition of Ghana Cards for voter registration, the National Identification Authority (NIA) has been urged by the Electoral Commission (EC) to get sufficient funding from the government.
The European Commission (EC) claimed that this would allow the nation to do away with the guarantor system sooner because it was rife with difficulties, prone to misuse, and not the best choice for the nation’s efforts to modernize its electoral system. Ghana Card
Samuel Tettey, a Deputy Chairperson of the EC responsible for Operations, stated during a news conference in Accra on Tuesday, October 17, that the recent restricted voter registration drive exposed the misuse of the guarantor system, with minors being forced to register.
“The commission detests encouraging children to sign up.
This is illegal.
It does not bode well for our country, and we implore all stakeholders and individuals to join the commission in order to fix this long-standing problem.
The unfortunate truth is that adults who ought to know better took these children to registration centers via bus,” the speaker stated. Ghana Card
However, the Deputy EC Chairperson promised that people who took advantage of the guarantor system and provided guarantees for more than ten individuals as required by law would face legal repercussions.
Mr. Tettey emphasized that the Ghana Card continues to be the most trustworthy way to validate one’s citizenship and maintain the integrity of the nation’s voter list.
“The recently concluded voter registration drive demonstrates the egregious misuse of the guarantor system. Ghana Card Ghana Card
The majority of the sub-regions nations—Nigeria, South Africa, Senegal, Rwanda, and Kenya, to name a few—do not accept the guarantor system as proof of citizenship.
“The guarantor system needs to be eliminated as quickly as possible if we are sincere about bolstering our voting procedures.
We want the government to support NIA,” he stated.
In order to provide legal support for the EC’s initiative to sanitize the register, the Deputy EC Chairperson further urged Parliament to approve the C.I. on voter registration, which designates the Ghana Card as the only source document for registration.
Press conference
The press conference, titled “Let the citizens know,” was one of the EC’s regular public outreach efforts to enlighten the public on its operations.
The EC utilized its press conference yesterday to inform the public about a recent restricted voter registration drive that it ran at its district offices across the nation. Ghana Card
Mr Tettey explained that the EC decided to conduct the registration exercise at its district offices and not at electoral areas because it did not factor the exercise in electoral areas in its 2023 budget and work plan. He, therefore, denied certain reports that the EC attributed the failure to conduct the exercise in electoral areas because of Parliament’s failure to approve its budget. “The EC has not stated anywhere that Parliament is to be blamed for not approving its budget, hence its decision to register voters at the District Offices. The EC stated that it prepared a draft C.I. for a Continuous Registration exercise in all its district offices nationwide and had the C.I. passed, the EC would have had some six (6) months to register voters at a time of their choice.”
Measure
In an attempt to guarantee that every eligible voter registered, the EC said that all of its employees were given instructions to provide chits or numbers to all applicants waiting in line by 5 p.m. on the previous day, instructing them to visit the registration centers the next day to complete the registration process.
The purpose of the strategy was to guarantee that all applicants who showed up at the registration centers on the final day and were waiting in line by 5 p.m. or earlier were actually registered the day after the deadline.
Mr. Tettey stated that while certain registration centers listed a certain number of applicants in line, the majority of centers had less than 50 candidates in line, and in certain situations, there were none at all.
The EC presented a table with 36 registration centers spread across five districts and 1,397 individuals waiting in line as of 5 p.m.; at 17 of the centers, there were no persons in line.
Swapping cards
The Deputy EC head also declared that the commission has begun to swap out voter ID cards in the Oti Region’s Guan District.
According to him, the election will take place from October 3 to November 2, and all qualified voters must visit the EC’s district office located in Likpe.
He explained that the procedure was required because Guan District voters registered in the Jasikan District in 2020 and their cards needed to be changed to represent Guan District.
“As the Guan District was established, voter identification cards containing the Jasikan District code had to be updated to the Guan District code.
Therefore, voters in the Guan District are kindly asked to bring their old voter ID cards to the District office and the exhibition centers during the exhibition time in order to pick up their new or replaced ones, according to Mr. Tettey.