The Electoral Commission (EC) has indicated it will forward to the Attorney General for prosecution some persons who criminally endorsed nomination forms for presidential aspirants for the 2016 elections, which has led to thirteen of them being disqualified from the race.
Some of the criminal offenses like corruption, deceiving a public officer and perjury, were the reasons some of the aspirants were disqualified.
According to the EC, these acts are criminal in nature, hence their decision to ask the Attorney General to prosecute such persons.
Evidence of some of the offenses were seen in the forms of the Progressive People’s Party’s (PPP) aspirant, Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom, the All People’s Congress’ Hassan Ayariga, and the Independent People’s Party’s (IFP) Kofi Akpaloo, among others.
In the case of Dr. Nduom, the EC revealed that one of the subscribers who endorsed his nomination form was found to be legitimately on the register of the Volta Region, yet he went ahead to sign the forms in the Central Region as well with different signatures. The name of the subscriber was given as Richard Aseda.
Thus the Commission has said it will “refer the matter of the possible forgeries of these signatures to the Ghana Police Service and the Attorney General for investigation and prosecution in line with the following sections of the Criminal Offences Act, 1960 (Act 29): Section 211: Perjury, Section 248: making false declaration etc. for office or voting, Section 251: Deceiving a public officer and Section 256: Corruption, intimidation and personation in respect of election.”
The IPP’s Kofi Akpaloo, Hassan Ayariga of the APC, Dr. Nana Agyenim Boateng of the United Front Party, Dr. Henry Herbert Lartey of the Great Consolidated Popular Party (GCPP) and Thomas Nuako Ward-Brew of the Democratic People’s Party, similarly had multiple subscribers having different signatures on the nomination forms, again raising questions as to the legitimacy of the signatures.
The EC has said it will likewise forward the matters pertaining to the various candidates to the police.
In the case of the Reformed Democrat’s Party (RDP) Kwabena Adjei, two subscribers for his forms are not registered voters as they are on the exclusion list for multiple registrations, according to the EC.
The two persons are listed as Stephen Owusu and Fusheini Mariama/ Abdulai Mariama; both possessing two voter ID cards each.
The EC has said it will call on the Ghana Police Service to investigate the named individuals for the electoral offence.
