The Electoral Commission (EC) has said the Biometric Verification Device (BVD) will feature prominently in the upcoming voters’ register exhibition exercise.
The exhibition exercise which will also run for three weeks is slated for the July 18 to August 7.
[contextly_sidebar id=”1tJrUnp4xsXjVqcDUs7o7CCeVIO8YYFU”]“There is another dimension we are trying to bring into the exhibition. The period of the exhibitions going to be extended from the normal two weeks to about three weeks; sufficient period,” the Deputy Commissioner of the EC in charge of operations, Amadu Sulley, said at a national police command conference in Accra.
“We are also bringing in the BVD’s, that is the biometric verification devices, which we normally use during elections, during voting,” he also said.
Voters require biometric verification
Speaking on the BVD’s that will be employed during the exhibition, Mr. Sulley said voters will be required to be verified biometrically during the exercise as this will help reduce most of the challenges associated with the BVD on Election Day.
“Now we want people to come during the exhibition to be verified biometrically. This will at least address the situation where these challenges come on the E day [Election Day]… when you come during exhibition and this is done, you will be in a position to know ‘I’m okay’.”
“If the machine is not able to recognize your finger, we will take note and find out what happened and put in place mechanisms to address this situation,” Mr. Sulley stated further.
Register will be cleaned during exhibition – EC
Appearing before the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of Parliament on Wednesday, Mr. Sulley said the exhibition process will help produce a credible register as ordered by the Supreme Court.
“It is during the exhibition that we are able to come up with a credible register or do the cleaning and there are various processes that lead to the cleaning of the voters’ register…whatever we are going to do next month, is going to be very legal and the processes will be clear. We can’t finish the exhibition before we come and say we are going to do another cleaning or we do cleaning before we get into the exhibition. The exhibition period is when we clean the register.”
Court’s order
The Commission’s decision to clean the register followed an order from the Supreme Court asking it to expunge names of persons who registered using the NHIS cards.
The ruling followed a suit filed by Abu Ramadan, and one, Evans Nimako, who in 2014 won a lawsuit that barred the use of NHIS cards for registration. The two, among other reliefs, wanted the current register declared inappropriate for the November polls.
The court also ordered the EC to delete names of deceased persons as well as ineligible persons whose names are on the register.
The seemingly lackadaisical approach by the EC to the courts ruling was met with intense criticism from sections of the public as calls for further clarity of the ruling were made.
The Supreme Court subsequently ordered the EC to furnish it with the full list of persons who registered NHIS cards as a form of identification, in six days.
They further ordered that the EC to provide them with a detailed plan on how they were going to carry out the deletion and re-registration of the people, who registered with the NHIS cards.
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By: Delali Adogla-Bessa/citifmonline.com/Ghana