Prang (Brong Ahafo) -- A group of five young men, on Friday stormed the two voters' registration centres at Prang in the Atebubu District and violently seized all the registration materials in protest against the involvement of an alleged NDC sympathiser in the exercise.
The group accused Mohammed Gariba, a deputy returning officer in Atebubu North constituency during the 2000 general elections of a bias attitude in favour of the NDC. Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) Mr. Benignus Cephas Bediako, Atebubu District Police Commander told the Ghana News Agency (GNA) that the police later retrieved the materials.
Some of the registration forms and an ink could not, however, be accounted for, he said. The group has since refused to respond to a police invitation. Mr. Bediako described the incident as unfortunate but added that the action of the group stemmed from ignorance. He noted that ignorance about national issues was a major problem for some people in the district.
The electorate must see every national exercise as paramount to every other activity and differentiate between issues of national interest and those of partisan political and sectional interests, he said. The district commander however added that sanity had prevailed as the exercise was progressing smoothly.
Mr. Gabriel Dei, District electoral officer confirmed the incident but said the allegation was "baseless" because there was nothing like "returning officer" in the current registration exercise. The district electoral officer explained that Mr Gariba was not even a registration official in the exercise.
Mr. Dei condemned the action, saying that "no matter how genuine one's reasons may be, one has no right to obstruct the registration process or seize the materials", since it violated the constitutional instrument (CI) 12 under the 1992 constitution.