Educate Ghanaians On Electoral Process — K.B. Asante

A retired diplomat, Mr K. B. Asante, has stressed the need for Ghanaians to be adequately educated to understand the electoral process.

This, he explained, would serve the interests of Ghanaians and make them knowledgeable about democratic governance and leadership to improve democracy.

Mr Asante gave the advice in Accra at the launch of Unitas, a non-governmental organisation that seeks to facilitate sustained development in society.

He said it behoved electors to monitor the way and manner in which elections were conducted by all partners to ensure that their civic rights were not abused.

Mr Asante advised the electorate not to allow politicians to use them for their own political interests, adding that it was important for Ghanaians to be careful and check the motive of politicians before having anything to do with them.

“Otherwise their ambition to assume leadership roles in future would be jeopardised by the very politicians who appear to be helping them,” he added.

He urged the country to be guided by the feasibility and viability of programmes and policies of the various political parties and cast their votes based on informed choices, adding that "this is necessary because this country must be ruled by capable, transparent and credible persons, if our future is to be secure".

The Executive Director of Unitas, Mrs Victoria Awua-Mensah, said the key issues of democracy lay in the principles that the legitimacy of power, making decisions about people's lives and society, were the perogatives of the electors.

She said without citizens participating in free and fair elections, the principle of popular control over government could not be realised and challenged stakeholders in the electoral process to ensure that majority of the citizens participated peacefully during and after elections.

The Deputy General Secretary in charge of Operations of the National Democratic Congress, Mr Elvis Afriyie Ankrah, said Ghana had advanced in multi-party democracy and gone beyond the situation that called for power sharing after elections and “cannot afford to use this backward system of power-sharing” to promote democratic rule.

He appealed to all Ghanaians to also endorse the call to totally reject the phenomenon of power-sharing that he said was gradually creeping into Africa. "We have a responsibility to avert such a situation," he said.

A minute silence was observed in honour of the late Minister of Finance, Kwadwo Baah-Wiredu.