Graphic Town Hall meetings move to Cape Coast
The last edition of the Graphic Town Hall meetings for this year will take place at the Cape Coast Town Hall at Baakano in the Central Regional capital today.
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Representatives of the political parties will be taking turns to sell their messages, as well as pledge to embark on peaceful electioneering.
Already town hall events have been held in Bolgatanga, Sunyani and Koforidua in the Upper East, Brong Ahafo and Eastern regions in the last three weeks.
The Graphic Town Hall meetings aim at giving political parties the platform to pledge peace and sell their messages.
As part of the Cape Coast event, there will be a radio discussion on ATL FM 100.5FM at 9 a.m. to be hosted by Paul Amanfo Ofori where the Editor of Daily Graphic, Mr Ransford Tetteh, and the Political Editor, Mr Kobby Asmah, will throw light on the event.
The two leading political parties, the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC), and other political parties such as the Progressive People’s Party (PPP), Convention Peoples Party (CPP), Peoples National Convention (PNC) will be participating in the event.
Koforidua
At the Koforidua meeting last week, the Deputy Eastern Regional Director of the Electoral Commission Mr John Appiah Baffoe, provided a clarification on how proxy voting could be done.
He explained that before a proxy application could go through the applicant and the proxy voter should both present themselves at the EC district office for their fingerprints to be validated.
Bolgatanga
At the Bolgatanga meeting, the discussants were of the view that the December polls were a contest of ideas and so must be devoid of rancour, personal attacks and offensive language.
They stressed the need to disagree and agree on issues and preach as well as tell supporters not to beat war drums and avoid following parochial interests.
During open forum, some of the participants pointed out the need for politicians to appreciate the achievements of successive governments with the view to ensuring continuity as a way of promoting peace.
Sunyani
In Sunyani, participants stressed the need for the state to make it unprofitable for perpetrators of violence to engage in the act before, during and after the elections.
They, therefore, urged radio discussion panel members and hosts to guard against insults, lies and personality attacks.
Leading the discussion on the need for peace before, during and after the elections, the Brong Ahafo Regional Director of the National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE), Mr Issah Nasagri, said political parties “have regrettably made perpetrators of violence honourable people in our society”.
He said those people became leaders through their nuisance values and “we as a people or nation, are forced to accept them as our leaders”.
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