Tension is currently brewing at some of the polling stations in the Assin North Constituency in the ongoing by-election.
The election is characterised by tension, assaults and intimidation from some of the officers of the Ghana Police Service and the opposition NDC thugs who were allegedly deployed to the 99 Polling centres to disrupt the voting process.
The NDC leaders who stormed the voting centres were accusing the NPP of vote buying with money which forced their thugs to create confusion at the centres.
The situation forced the Police to intervene but the NPP members say the Police are intimidating them by arresting their members and allowing the NDC thugs to create unnecessary tension at the voting centres.
There is a high turnout of voters at some of the voting centres as people are coming out in their numbers to vote.
At some of the centres, the NDC thugs were harassing the voters, especially at the NPP strongholds putting fear in them not to come out to vote.
At the Assin Breku Polling station where three centres were set up, the NDC thugs took over the whole venue, which attracted a lot of the residents to besiege the voting centres.
The presence of the NDC thugs at the centres ends up frustrating the Electoral Commission officials which forced the Police to deploy more armed men to the venue to maintain law and order.
The NPP Polling agents and observers were harassed by the NDC and some of the Police officers deployed there to maintain law and order.
In that process, some of the NPP supporters including polling agents who protested against the Police intimidation were arrested and whisked to the Assin Central Police Station.
They were later discharged.
The situation as of 11am brought tension at the Assin Breku polling stations, which forced the National Officers of the NPP led by the General Secretary, Justin Frimpong Kodua, Gabby Asare Otchere-Darko, the Deputy Majority Leader, Alexander Afenyo Markin among others to rush to the voting centres to rescue the situation.
The NPP officials after back and forth with the Police managed to bring the situation under control to calm the NPP members who were chanting war songs against the Police.
At the other polling centres, the turnout was low which forced the NPP to embark on house-to-house to ask the residents to go and vote since it’s their right.
Before the election, the Electoral Commission in a meeting together with the Police, NPP and NDC, banned the use of mobile phones or gadgets that can take photographs at the voting centres.
–BY Daniel Bampoe