The Electoral Commission (EC) has urged all political parties with representatives at registration centres nationwide to publish their data on the limited voters’ registration exercise.
The EC strongly believes that due to its transparency in sharing data with political parties daily, the parties’ data will align with the EC’s records.
In a press statement, the Commission emphasised that this transparency will not only dispel allegations of secret registrations but also build public trust in the EC.
“The ongoing Limited Registration Exercise allows Agents of Political Parties to be present at all Registration Centres. Accredited Observer Groups and media personnel also have access to all Registration Centres across the country. Additionally, the Commission provides Agents of the Political Parties both Start-of-Day and End-of-Day Reports.”
“This enables them to cross-check the “information” received against their individual records to ensure that, at the end of each day, the total registered voters published by the Electoral Commission is not different from what the Political Parties collate at all Registration Centres nationwide,” the statement read.
The Commission acknowledged errors in specific infographics and corrected them, stressing that these errors did not pertain to the actual number of registered voters per district and region.
The EC maintained that its data on the exercise is accurate, adding that no political party has disputed the registration figures published by the Commission.
“This is because their records tally with that of the Commission. The Commission urges the Political Parties who are key stakeholders in the electoral process, to publish their collated daily registration figures from all gazetted Registration Centres and inform the public if the figures published by the Commission do not reflect the number of voters registered at the gazetted Registration Centres, where their Agents are stationed.”
“It is a well-known fact that as a result of the transparent processes put in place by the Commission at all Registration Centres nationwide, no entity, including the Commission can add or take away from the figures recorded daily at all Registration Centres.”
The EC’s statement responds to allegations by Election Watch Ghana that missing Biometric Voter Registration (BVR) Kits are being used to secretly register people in the ongoing limited voters’ registration exercise.
They claimed that the total number of voters registered provided by the EC on some days differed from the NDC’s figures, suggesting that missing BVR kits were being used for secret registrations.
However, EC described those claims as baseless. The Commission explained that it has not lost BVR kits but rather, five laptops which operate alongside other parts of the BVR kits.
These stolen laptops, without the other components of the BVR kits like a fingerprint scanner, a digital camera and a printer, cannot be activated on their own to register people, the EC indicated.
“The Commission never reported that Biometric Voter Registration (BVR) Kits have been stolen. The Commission notified the security agencies that five laptops were missing. The Commission subsequently informed all stakeholders about the missing laptops,” parts of the statement read.
“Describing the missing laptops as BVRs is a deliberate attempt by certain groups to deceive the public, in order to sustain their unfounded allegations. We repeat, the five missing laptops on their own cannot be used to register voters,” the EC stated.
