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24.03.2012 Editorial

The Time Is Due

By Daily Guide
Biometric machineBiometric machine
24.03.2012 LISTEN

The much-talked-about biometric voter registration exercise commences in some parts of the country today. As an important part of the electoral process, forming arguably the bedrock of credible polls, all must show adequate interest in the exercise by partaking in it and protecting it from caprices and blemishes.

So much money and other resources have gone into organizing this exercise because no amount is too big for an exercise whose proper management can ensure a peaceful election.

Contentious polls in some countries on the African continent have been attributed to compromised elections, resulting in bloody conflicts and total breakdown of law and order.

Governments have fallen and innocent persons forced into exile when conflicts set in after disagreements between contending parties in elections challenges attributable to warped election processes. This is what the biometric exercise and the verification segment are supposed to obviate.

Little wonder therefore that when the proposal for the adoption of the biometric registration and the verification process, regardless of the cost involved were put forth, they met with little or no disagreement.

We have a peace to protect as a people because posterity would judge us harshly when the cohesive country we came to meet is shredded into pieces. God forbid.

Isolated reports of people with entrenched political interests maneuvering to breach the regulations underpinning the process have been reported. We are unable to authenticate these allegations but can hasten to state that any attempt at undermining the integrity of the process is as unpatriotic as it is dangerous.

It can only be imagined the security fallouts when the integrity of the process is punctured as a result of a flawed registration process. Allowing foreigners to register because this would shore up the chances of one political party against the other is something Ghanaians should resist by all means as allowed by law.

For those used to engaging in acts of electoral malfeasance, we pray that such persons have been sufficiently briefed about the near impossibility of replicating electoral thievery, under the biometric registration system and verification.

The biometric registration system must be supported by all Ghanaians to work in our interest because having spent so much we should not do anything to render the resources invested in it useless.

Foreigners and minors should not be encouraged to breach the law and pitch themselves against the law in an encounter in which they would be the losers.

We have come a long way in the development of our electoral processes; from the transparent ballot box to the photo ID card and now the biometric registration process.  

The biometric registration process is as good as the people for which it is meant to serve. Let us all, for the love of our country, join hands in making the exercise a hitch-free one.

We have all, by now, understood the fine details of the process and should be able to ensure that the regulations are strictly adhered to.

 
 

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