EC Prepares Supplementary Budget

THE Electoral Commission (EC) says it is drawing up a supplementary budget to cater for the unexpected number of newly registered voters. 

This is to ensure that the necessary election materials are procured to enable them to vote in the December polls, Isaac Kwame Boateng, Director of Finance of the EC, has said. 

Speaking to the Times in Accra yesterday in the presence of the EC's Director of Elections, Albert Kofi Arhin and Public Relations Officer, Christian Owusu Parry, Mr Boateng said "we do not know how many extra people have been captured so far, but indications are that it would be more than our projected figures for which we should prepare."  

Although he could not say how much the supplementary budget would be, Mr. Boateng said the Commission distributed an extra 960,000 registration forms, in the wake of shortages of registration materials at the centres. 

The Commission projected to register one million new voters consisting of those who had turned 18 and people who did not take part in past registration exercises. 

The original budget for the entire election is over GH¢42.6million, of which about GH ¢6.9million was allocated for the limited registration. 

Although the EC is looking for extra funds for the supplementary budget, it still doubts the eligibility of the excess numbers which went beyond the projected one million new voters. 

Mr Parry explained that the Commission based its projections on the 2000 population and housing census and the country's population growth rate of 2.8 per cent.

In addition to that, provision was made for about 400,000 registration forms to cater for those who did not register in previous exercises "and contingency cases." 

"Where did all these people in the queues come from?" he asked, and blamed politicians for abusing the system by encouraging minors and those who have registered already in the past to register.  

He said past projections for registration exercises were based on the same national statistics without problems, saying that the Commission planned adequately for the limited registration exercise. 

David Kanga, Deputy Chairman of the EC in charge of Finance and Administration, denied media reports that the commission has mismanaged funds allocated to it by the government. 

He said the EC has not accessed all the funds needed for the election, saying the Finance Ministry was releasing them in bits as and when the EC requests funds for a particular activity on the election calendar. 

Nana Ohene Ntow, General Secretary of the ruling New Patriotic Party was reported in the Monday issue of the Independent newspaper as calling on the EC to render accounts since it was suspected that the funds allocated to it for the election had been mismanaged.