Jean Mensa
We have never had such an open and transparent management of the electoral system in Ghana.
Until now, the Electoral Commission (EC) was, if you like, with the so-called ‘strong room’ mentality, something akin to a cult. Its pre-election activities were not meant for the citizens’ attention and so night-time transfer of voters’ details was feasible without notice.
We were unused to being briefed bi-weekly on electoral activities such as the just-ended voter registration exercise which doomsday politicians predicted would claim lives.
At the end of it all, we can confidently state that the EC deserves a pat on its back for a job well executed. The commission was not given a dog’s chance of making it even after accomplishing the task of managing the issue of the new regions.
The woman at the helm, including her able lieutenants, exhibited an adorable stoicism which cocooned them against threats of bloodshed and death from persons with blood-drawing records.
A lesson in remaining focused in the face of empty noise and threats when tasked with a major assignment such as managing a country’s polls has been learnt by most Ghanaians who cared to follow developments on the political terrain.
From ‘a new voters register would not come into being’ to ‘castrate me if it happens’ loud-mouths, we have reached an important milestone in our democracy. We prayed for it and the Creator has granted it.
Now, we know that electoral matters can be handled without having gadgets breaking down when they are put to use. Nowhere was it reported that the gadgets which were scorned as being old and could not deliver malfunctioned.
It is instructive that the active Covid-19 cases started dwindling in the twilight of the registration exercise. The so-called petition from a group of doctors, anesthetics, nurses and so on about the EC going to have the blood of Ghanaians on their hands have all but evaporated into thin air. Some asked for the shelving of the registration exercise and even the elections in December. What they did not ask for was an indefinite lockdown of the country.
Ghanaians must be commended for their exceptional show of patriotism in the face of an overwhelming number of foreigners seeking to turn the exercise into an ECOWAS affair, and such influx has always been the case. We have witnessed the inappropriate development and reduced it to the barest minimum only because those who sponsored the influx were subdued by a majority desire to stop Ghana from hosting an ECOWAS registration and election.
If we could maintain this level of patriotism, foreign elements would turn their backs on political parties which bus them into the country to decide on who becomes our president.
There is no denying the fact that Ghana is set to witness free, fair and credible elections. A credible register begets acceptable polls.