A leading member of the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP), Gabby Otchere Darko, says the current voters’ register is deeply flawed and requires more than a thorough clean-up.<\/p>\n
According to him, instances from the past suggests that the register continues\u00a0to be bloated even after a thorough cleaning.<\/p>\n
[contextly_sidebar id=”aid6FDCfLxTdapKPkOgENYVSqIrL5P13″]Speaking on Eyewitness News<\/strong> on Tuesday, Gabby observed that after \u201cthe last major registration in 2012, the Electoral Commission announced in June that it\u00a0found a little over 8,000 double registrations on the register.\u201d<\/p>\n He said \u201ca year later at the Supreme Court, Afari Gyan mentioned the same figure. Two years later, the EC came back to say\u00a0it had found another 68,000. A month later after the limited registration, the number shoots up to 72,000…the NPP just last month came out with\u00a0over 2,000 double registration on the register.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSo we\u2019ve been cleaning this register and every time we clean it, we found something wrong with it. It tells you that there is something fundamentally wrong irredeemably with the register and if we want to go ahead and say we want to play with it, while the basis of the register itself is flawed, then you have an issue.\u201d<\/p>\n The NPP has petitioned the Electoral Commission with supposed evidence to back their claim that the\u00a0current\u00a0register is bloated with names of minors and foreigners but the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC) disagrees.<\/p>\n According to the NDC, the register needs cleaning or auditing instead of compiling a new one.<\/p>\n But Gabby Otchere Darko maintained that it is dangerous to go into the 2016 general elections with a register that is flawed.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have to ask, how do we have a register that will not be open to query, questions and doubts. That should be the question and not the other way round,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n –<\/p>\n By: Godwin A. Allotey\/citifmonline.com\/Ghana<\/p>\n