Registration of Prisoners: EC kept all political parties in the dark – NPP

Director of Elections of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Martin Adjei-Mensah Korsah, says the recent registration of prisoners across the country by the Electoral Commission (EC) was done at the blind side of the political parties.

The act, he noted, was an affront to the rules of engagement and which raises transparency and credibility issues.

“There is a big question mark with regards to the transparency in the registration of prisoners. Before Monday, August 22, 2016, the EC was going to register prisoners and the district Electoral Officers had signed memos going round. Meanwhile, all the political parties were not informed. We did not discuss it at IPAC. Even if you want to implement it, you have to write to all the political parties inviting agents to scrutinize it. We made several calls and they confirmed that they were going to do it”.

“Meanwhile, the rules of engagement in this exercise are the same as every other process. Every registration exercise requires the presence of party agents to help check the eligibility of prospective applicants. In this instance, the EC did not inform us. This is not the first time we are doing registration in the prisons”.

“In 2012 registration was carried out in all the prisons and the political parties were informed but this time around no. Once you do that you are not helping with transparency; you are not helping with inclusiveness. That is not professionalism. You are not helping your work to have the integrity that it deserves. So, these are the things that will continue to create problems if the Commission doesn’t open itself up and making sure that what they are doing is transparent and carry the people along – at the inclusive process to clear doubts in the mind of the people”, he noted.

Mr. Adjei-Mensah Korsah’s reaction comes at the backdrop of the third anniversary of the Election Petition case which verdict was given on August 22, 2013 by the Supreme Court of the land and the lessons learnt from the exercise.

He was interacting with Accra FM on Tuesday when he made those observations.

Commenting further, he said although a lot of reforms have been initiated by the EC after the Election Petition case with some already being implemented, the cardinal ones would be put to test on the election-day.

So, by and large, moving on from 2013, I feel that all the reforms that have been initiated, this is the time to test it, especially, as we get closer to the elections. On the d-day we have to test it.

“Moving on from 2013, I feel that all the reforms that have been initiated, this is the time to test it, especially, as we get closer to the elections. On the d-day we have to test it”, he added.