Dome-Kwabenya polling station re-run subverts the will of the people; EC must backtrack — Prof. Gyampo

Senior political science lecturer at the University of Ghana, Professor Ransford Gyampo, has taken issue with the Electoral Commission’s (EC) decision to rerun the election at the Abokobi Women’s Development Centre 2 polling station in the Dome Kwabenya constituency.

In a social media post on Saturday, December 28, Prof. Gyampo described the EC’s move as a threat to democracy, stating that it undermines the sovereign will of voters.

“You cannot punish the people by asking them to go queue again to vote, just because they rightfully made their choice and you wrongfully recorded their choice on a wrong sheet,” he wrote. “This subverts the will of the people, and the EC must backtrack!”

The EC announced the rerun after discrepancies emerged during the collation process for the Dome Kwabenya parliamentary election. Results from 367 polling stations were successfully collated, but errors were identified in three remaining results.

One of the results, involving 669 registered voters, was rejected because it had been recorded on a training sheet instead of the approved statement of poll.

Dr. Serebour Quaicoe, Director of Training at the EC, explained that the error could significantly influence the outcome of the election.

The margin between the two leading candidates was just 165 votes, and allocating the rejected votes to the trailing candidate would reverse the results.

“The commission rejected one of them outrightly on the stance that it was declared on a wrong statement of poll because they used training sheets, which is not the one that they should use,” Dr. Quaicoe said.