EC suspends Election Steering Committee
The Electoral Commission (EC) has suspended the 18-member Election Steering Committee following complaints that some of the members were partisan.
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Consequently, the commission has decided to hold on with activities of the committee, repackage and present it for further discussion at IPAC. When everybody agrees that the EC can go ahead with it, then it would be continued.
This was agreed upon at an Inter Party Advisory Committee (IPAC) meeting held in Accra on Friday.
On the agenda at the IPAC meeting were issues on limited and continuous voter registration, political party registration and manual verification. The issue of the steering committee was discussed under other matters.
The EC set up the steering committee, appointing other people to add up to the seven commissioners of the EC but the political parties said they were not consulted.
At the IPAC meeting on Friday, the EC accepted it was at fault and apologised for not consulting the political parties and was therefore “putting on hold,” activities of the steering.
It rather said it was going back to the drawling board and that the political parties would hear later from the EC,
This was after all political parties present had unanimously agreed that they did not even understand the terms of reference of the steering committee.
The pressure group, Let My Vote Count Alliance (LMVCA) and some political parties had raised concerns about the manner in which the EC set up the committee, claiming IPAC was not informed.
LMVCA had accused the EC of playing party cards in the formation of the committee, fingering a card holding member of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC), Dr Karl Mark Arhin, the Deputy Executive Secretary of the National Service Scheme and Mr Francis Azumah, Executive Secretary of the National Peace Council.
On Thursday the Electoral Commission (EC) through its Public Affairs Director, Mr Christian Owusu Parry said it will not dissolve the 18-member Steering Committee it set up to play what it says is a key role ahead of this year's elections.
The committee which is chaired by the Chairperson of the EC, Mrs. Charlotte Osei includes acting boss of the Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ) Joseph Whittal and COP Christian Tetteh Yohuno, the Director-General of Police Operations.
Other members of the committee are Col F. Ogbe, Deputy Director General of Joint Operations from the Ghana Armed Forces, Mr Samuel Asare Akuamoah, Deputy Chairman in charge of operations at NCCE, Mr Bernard Ntim, Head of Planning, Budgeting, Monitoring Unit at the Ghana Education Service (GES), Mr Francis Azumah, Executive Secretary of National Peace Council, Mr George Sarpong, Executive Secretary, National Media Commission (NMC), and Sylvester K. B. Rabbles, Director of Prisons Operations, Ghana Prisons Service.
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