Institutional Reformation Or Voters Register?

Eversince the time Ghana returned to democratic rule in 1992, electoral processes have undergone various reforms in enhancing free and fair elections.

This has happened from stage to stages in different forms with an increase spate of unacceptability and with a growing tension that seems to build up sarcasm, wreak havoc, cynicism and risk bringing down hard work and sacrifices of the great children of this land; just for the sake of working towards electing one among us to govern us.

With dissipating electoral laws, the nation shall fall asunder to the whims and caprices of the few corrupt ones among us who desire to bait on patronage.

Such an enervate situation nurses cynicism, insurgency and deep factionalism and runs down a state, especially where the winner of an election takes up management of the entire nation with his minions, cronies and favourites without recourse to giving any divisional management to the opposition or minority parties. The winning team exercise jurisdictions on every national policy she deems fit even if it may yield negatively to the state in favour of their political parties.

To elect people to make decision that governs us and dictate the pace of this brief life we live calls for participatory democracy as indicated by Articles 21(3), 35.6(d), 55(10), 240.2(e)) of the 1992 constitution. It is fundamental epitome of democracy and all of us must surrender to it under the umbrella of the rule of law by the people and of the people for the people.

It must be binding on us that, our electoral process must not divide us by keeping others engaged and others as strangers looking aloof at the whims and caprices of the winner of an elections. We are all members of the homeland Ghana, though majority must have her way, the minority must also have a share of works and responsibilities in treating everything about mother Ghana to recoup some of the exorbitant monies expended in the campaign trail. That shall reduce the tension come any general election.

These electoral designed system of First Past The Post (FPTP) win for Members of Parliament, and a direct election of Presidential Candidates with a staggering of over 50% valid votes cast in favour of a Presidential candidate to win to become the President of Ghana is never the culture and tradition of any of the people of Ghana neither has it been the practice of any other advance democratic nation that has colonized mother Ghana but of France, the only nation with such an electoral system among the Great 8 nation of the world.

France lacks an institution akin to Ghana National House of Chiefs. They also do not have the desire to create an intermediary institution to elect the National Head of State like the United States Electoral College. But in all the dilemma, France finances and sponsor political parties to the brim for public offices unlike mother Ghana where political parties got to sponsor candidates to any public office except district assembly election. District Assembly is also not sponsored by the State of Ghana.

France abrogation of Chieftaincy Institutions at the onset of the French Revolution (June/July, 1789) and overthrow of the Bourbon Monarch (Louis XVI); August/September 1792 and continued with establishment of the "First Republic” made them to lose their guards, and suffered inconsistency of political administration and today with multiple revolutions, coups and coup d’état in their memoire de France, they are quavering in at the fifth republican constitution created in 1958.

The inherent and pervasive difficulties with mother Ghana’s political hacienda is that, power centeredness in the executive arm of government like that of France and the methods of electing the Chief Executive officer of Ghana and the administrative institutional structures has not been structured to be of all-inclusive nature in manning the Ghanaian national affairs.

Identifications of State Institutions under Article 34.1 of the constitution 1992 namely the Presidency, the Parliament, the Judiciary, the Council of State, the Cabinet, are very essential and primordial to democratic progression. The President of Ghana, in exception of the Judiciary, is grossly implanted in these state institutions contrary to norms of democratic practice and contrary to how the President of United States and the President of France among the G8 Nations of the world are established.

The wisdom under which Article 63.3 and 57.1 of the 1992 constitution was made is disturbing, scary and contrary to what developed democracies have adopted to achieve their democratic ascension.

Though copycat, fabrications and imitations are not exemplary of good achievements but in politics, we learn from good practice and assimilate it as the bulwark of copious achievements, hence John Dickinson, the Penman of the Constitution of the United States admonished his colleagues at the convention that, “Experience must be our only guide, reason may mislead us.” So they adopted Polybius theory advanced by Baron de Montesquieu and formed their government.

Ghanaians as we are, we need not to hustle over putting up institutions of state to promote good democratic governance and dud conflicting system that shall tear us apart knowing that, we are no longer fighting for independence, we are rather manning our own affairs and we acknowledge two heads are better than one.

Too much concentration of power in the Presidency of Ghana is acknowledged under Article 57.1 and Article 91.3 and 92.8 of the constitution 1992 has compromised the strength of the Council of State to serve as the countervailing authority to check on either the Executive (the Presidency) or to serve as an extended chamber of parliament with locus.

Yes Ghana has a vibrant political scenes and the free speech is overwhelmingly great but governance does not seem to improve causing the people to feel disillusioned with the way democracy is practiced, that is a great worry for all the political parties and the politicians.

To curb on ills of power concentration and weakening position of the Parliament of Ghana, Safe Democracy Ghana advocates for the creation of a second chamber parliament to serve as a countervailing authority with membership of the house to be organizational representatives.

Safe Democracy Ghana advocates that, organized labour or members of the Ghana Trade Union Congress and the Ghana Labour Organization shall elect among themselves and present a candidate each to the Second Chamber Parliament.

Then members of the National Peace Council under Act 818 (2011) shall present a candidate each, then the ten Regional Houses of Chiefs of Ghana shall present 20 members of which ten shall be Queen Mothers.

Retired heads of national security agencies of a given rank and judges of the supreme court of a given rank in their organizational form shall present a candidate each.

These groups of persons elected by their organizations shall constitute the Second Chamber Parliament and shall serve as the countervailing authority and they shall be responsible to State of Ghana.

These shall bring good governance to bare. With continued political exuberance in our homeland Ghana we shall sail across the Bermuda triangle.

Changing System, an answer to our electoral problems.

Direct election by adult suffrage of a Nation’s Chief Executive Officer or institution without the State sponsoring the candidates or their political parties is very chaotic, expensive, and cumbersome as it breeds fanaticism, intolerance and influences ethnicity and tribalism in a multi ethnic society like Ghana where the State care less and citizens, in their political party form, grossly expends monies on a candidate to secure him/her a public office position. A peroxide way of creating divisions and fanning patronage of highest order.

Political and economic issues are hardly the main interest discussants on political platform could debate conscientiously with vehemence to make good meaning and understanding to their listeners rather the interest lay on how to win elections to recoup amount invested and make profit.

Direct and indirect election of chief executive officers of a state has its pros and cons. It is however gratifying to adopt system where some level of trust are entertained and which most nations and institutions around the world practice. Populated organizations around the world adhere to indirect election to elect their Chief Executive Officers including the Pope of Rome, the Bishop of Canterbury, the President of the European Union, the President of United Nation, The Secretary General of the United Nation, the President and the Secretary General of ECOWAS, the President of African Union and etc.

Our homeland Ghana has been blessed with traditional authorities akin to traditional authorities in Malaysia who in turn among themselves serve as head of state of Malaysia, a nation that got her independence around the same time Ghana received her independence. We are also fortunate the rule of law operates within the chieftaincy institutions in Ghana and therefore, we shall not need Electoral College system as is done in the United States of America to elect the President of Ghana. We are proud to be embolden with fantastic system where all Paramount Chiefs of this Republic are members. They converge and elect among them their leadership.

From Traditional Councils through to the Regional Houses of Chiefs to the National House of Chiefs under Act 759 (2008), members of the Regional Houses of Chiefs elects their leadership and form committees to deliberate on issues affecting them. Five Paramount Chiefs are elected from each region by its members to the National House of Chiefs. Members of the National House of Chiefs also elect among themselves their leadership including the President and the Vice President.

Safe Democracy Ghana desires that, the President of the National House of Chiefs who got screened from the base as a Paramount Chief and Member of a Regional House of Chiefs and rose to the National House of Chiefs and got elected by the fifty strong members of the National House of Chiefs as the President of the National House of Chiefs deserves to be the Ceremonial President of Ghana to compliment the position of the President of the fiduciaries of the land that makes Ghana under Article 36(8) and 267 (1) of the constitution 1992.

This efforts translate Article 39 (1,2,3, and 4) of the 1992 constitution into a working and growing document as the people of Ghana would have their political administration to portray their culture and tradition.

Article 39 1. Subject to clause (2) of this article, the State shall take steps to encourage the integration of appropriate customary values into the fabric of national life through formal and informal education and the conscious introduction of cultural dimensions to relevant aspects of national, planning.

2. The State shall ensure that appropriate customary and cultural values are adapted and developed as an integral part of the growing needs of the society as a whole; and in particular that traditional practices which are injurious to the health and well-being of the person are abolished.

3. The State shall foster the development of Ghanaian languages and pride in Ghanaian culture.

4. The State shall endeavour to preserve and protect places of historical interest and artefacts

By translating the above constitutional provisions into practicable actions our act in consolidating culture and democracy in contemporary Ghana under the patronage of Act 759 (2008), we finally might have arrived in the creation of an institution of Ceremonial Presidency, participatory democracy in actions and we are resolved to move from divisionism to participatory system. God bless our homeland Ghana.

Ghana’s Chief Executive Officer or Leader of Government Businesses shall be in the bosom of the majority leader of the lower parliament as contained in the previous constitutions we have practiced before of 1957, 1960 and 1969 constitutions where the Chief Executive Officer of the land is indirectly elected by the great Honourable Members of the Parliament of Ghana. When he fouls and diverts from the national developmental agenda, him or her losses votes of confidence of his/her own peers, the Honourable Members of Parliament and a change is instituted promptly. We would not wait all those four long years before a change is gained through election.

Albeit institutional change proposed by Safe Democracy Ghana, electoral reform of proportional representative system is necessary for all-inclusive participatory democracy to contain all political parties in Ghana in the House of Commons or the lower Parliament of Ghana.

No more wrangling to elect the President of Ghana and perspicacity, prudence and moral uprightness shall be the hallmark of the Head of Government of Ghana and much as political parties shall be the driving gears of the nation’s economies, the People of Ghana shall have a Senate, House of Lords or a Second Chamber Parliament to represent the state and protect the nation against imprudent, hasty and proscriptive legislation of a nation without a Second Chamber Parliament.

God has already blessed our homeland Ghana, we must take it upon ourselves to do the right things.

Munir Saani
Executive Secretary
Safe Democracy Ghana