The Director of IT and Elections for the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), Dr. Edward Omane Boamah, has strongly criticized the Electoral Commission (EC) of Ghana for committing significant errors in its reporting of voter registration challenge figures.
According to Dr Boamah, the unfortunate development cast doubt over the reliability and transparency of the Electoral Commission’s processes as the country heads for the December 7, 2024, presidential and parliamentary elections.
The opposition party’s Director of IT and Elections began his criticism of the Electoral Commission by stating that the EC initially reported that the Upper East Region had 981 challenges filed, a figure that was visibly inconsistent with the bar graph representation, which showed the Greater Accra Region with a much taller bar despite having the same number of challenges.
He emphasized that such elementary mistakes are unacceptable and reminiscent of the serial errors that plagued the declaration of the 2020 presidential election results.
These mistakes, according to Dr. Boamah, undermine public confidence in the electoral process and raise serious questions about the Electoral Commission’s competence and reliability.
“The Electoral Commission of Ghana: These elementary errors are unacceptable! From the Bar graph Upper East and Greater Accra have 981 challenges filed per region. Yet, the graph of Greater Accra is way taller than that of Upper East”.
Dr Edward Omane Boamah, Director of IT and Elections, National Democratic Congress
Commenting on the Electoral Commission’s latest update, which corrected the reported figure for the Upper East Region from 981 to 149, the former Minister of Communications under the erstwhile Mahama’s administration posited that while the correction addresses the immediate error, it does little to alleviate the broader concerns about the Electoral Commission’s accuracy and transparency.
He emphasized that such errors must not be repeated in the upcoming elections, stressing the importance of free, fair, and transparent electoral processes.
“The Electoral Commission of Ghana has once again corrected the avoidable error that we posted here on Facebook. They have corrected the challenges filed for Upper East as 149 instead of their initial figure of 981. These errors by the EC in air-conditioned offices at the headquarters of the EC do not bode well for Ghana’s democracy”.
Dr Edward Omane Boamah, Director of IT and Elections, National Democratic Congress
Moreover, the National Democratic Congress Director of IT and Elections Dr. Edward Omane Boamah reiterated the opposition party’s commitment to ensuring the integrity of the election process, stressing that the party is scaling up its restless quest for free, fair, and transparent elections.
He called for an independent bipartisan parliamentary inquiry into the Electoral Commission’s operations ahead of the December 7 polls, asserting that such investigation is non-negotiable.
Additionally, Dr Omane Boamah underscored the National Democratic Congress’s commitment to explore all available options to safeguard the integrity and sanctity of the country’s electoral process.
He emphasized that the call for an independent inquiry into the Electoral Commission’s operations by the opposition National Democratic Congress is underscored by the urgent need to avert any potential for errors and irregularities in the upcoming elections.
The Electoral Commission (EC), in an earlier statement announced a correction to an error found in its published data concerning challenge cases.
The EC, in its statement, stated that its fact-checking revealed that the figure for Greater Accra was mistakenly duplicated for Upper East on one of their infographics with the misstep highlighted on a slide dedicated to challenge cases, casting a temporary shadow over the otherwise accurate presentation of electoral data.
However, the Electoral Commission clarified that the error was isolated to only one specific slide, stressing that all other slides are correct, reassuring the public and stakeholders of the overall integrity of the remaining data presented.
Further, the EC expressed its commitment to enhancing its data verification processes to prevent such errors in the future, adding that more rigorous methods will be instituted going forward.
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