A group calling itself the Coalition of Ghanaians Without Ghana Card (GWiGC) says the insistence of the Electoral Commission (EC) on accepting only the Ghana card as the sole document for registration to vote in the 2024 general elections is an affront to Ghana’s democracy.
The group is calling on the EC to rescind its decision, which it says is a sinister move to disenfranchise many citizens who do not have the card.
In a statement issued in Ho on Thursday, copied to the Ghana News Agency (GNA), the lead convener of the group, Richard Kasu, said: “It is important to note that the Electoral Commission’s (EC) unpopular position to amend the Constitutional Instrument (CI), particularly portions pertaining to the registration of voters, to make way for the Ghana Card as the sole document for registration or acquisition of a voter register means that a huge number of Ghanaians will not be able to register and vote.”
The group said the move is in total contravention of the provisions contained in Ghana’s 1992 Republican Constitution.
The statement said: “It is worth noting that the entrenched position taken by the Electoral Commission and the National Identification Authority (NIA) further reinforces our suspicion of a sinister move to suppress votes of some Ghanaians for whatever reason.”
The statement further said that the ongoing silent registration for the Ghana Card at various regional offices of the National Identification Authority (NIA) under the operational name “premium express” is worrying. Under this scheme, ordinary Ghanaians are required to pay an amount of GHC280 apart from having to travel from various parts of a particular region to its regional capital. The group called for an end to the commercialization of the process.
“In fact, what is more worrying is that Ghanaians, who even make efforts to move to district offices of the NIA seeking to register are unable to do so with several excuses from officials including network challenges and lack of printing cards among other flimsy excuses,” the statement observed.
The statement said that although the NIA law requires mass registration, the period within which such mass registration was organized was during the COVID-19 pandemic and due to government restrictions, it was impossible for all Ghanaians to participate in the registration exercise.
The statement called for an all-inclusive stakeholder discussion to make the Ghana Card registration process more progressive, accessible, and affordable to all Ghanaians at all times.
