Forget it, you can’t get away with whatever you want in 2024 – NDC warns EC

The largest opposition party- National Democratic Congress(NDC) has served notice that it will fiercely resist any attempt by the Electoral Commission to conduct itself in a manner that will affect the party’s electoral fortunes come 2024 general election.

According to the party, the EC will no more get away with its machinations and open bias against the NDC.

“…Let’s get this thing clear, listen very carefully, anybody who thinks that the EC can do whatever they want…they may have gotten away with some things in the past. Going forward, anybody who thinks the EC can do whatever they want and get away with it in 2024, that person must be living in kukuland,” the Director of Elections for the NDC Elvis Afriyie Ankrah stated at a press conference in Accra on Thursday.

Meanwhile, the party says it is strongly opposed to the establishment of the regional collation centres instituted by the Electoral Commission in the 2020 polls.

The NDC contends that the regional collation centres are not backed by law and must be unconstitutional and must be abolished.

The Electoral Commission at a two-day workshop which ended on Wednesday, May 19, 2021 conducted an assessment of the 2020 general election, stated its achievement and also made certain electoral reforms.

But addressing a press conference in Accra on Thursday, 20 May 2021 in reaction to the statement put out by the EC, NDC National Chairman, Samuel Ofosu Ampofo disclosed that the NDC has established its own committee to propose electoral reforms which it will put out soon for further deliberations.

“We as a party as indicated has put in place a powerful committee that is coming out with our proposed comprehensive electoral reforms and the committee is headed by Lawyer Nana Ato Dadzie…and [the final document] will be made available to the public, electoral commission and to stakeholders for us to deliberate.

“But I want to state strongly that we don’t need any intermediary between the constituency and the national electoral commission when it comes to the collation and announcing the presidential results.

“This is because we have only one returning officer for the presidential election and that returning officer is the electoral commissioner and so no one is given any constitutional right to play that role at any intermediary level and that is why we believe that the previous arrangement where results for presidential elections are collated at the constituency level and transmitted directly to the EC headquarters must be the order of the day.”