Electoral Commission Making Business With Our Democracy - Hassan Ayariga

Founder and Leader of All People’s Congress APC, Dr. Hassan Ayariga has accused the Electoral Commission EC of Ghana of making a business out of the country’s democracy which the commission is mandated to protect. “For me, I think that democracy now is for sale and not about competency anymore. It’s about those

who have money and can afford and mount a campaign or contest a presidential election”. Dr. Hassan Ayariga told the media in an interview on Monday. The Electoral Commission in a press briefing earlier on Monday stated that presidential candidates for this year’s elections are required to pay GH¢100,000 as filing fees

to enable them qualify to take part in the elections. Parliamentary candidates are also required to pay GH¢10,000 which saw no increment. The EC Chair Madam Jean Mensa also announced that filing of nomination forms begin on Monday, October 5 to Friday, October 9. The nomination forms would be available on

the EC’s website from 6:00pm Monday while candidate access the form with a unique password, the EC added. But speaking to the media after the announcement, Hassan Ayariga sharply reprimanded the commission describing it as a “weak institution” adding that it hard for him to believe the announcement.  “It’s hard for me

to believe the reason why there has been an increase of 100% of the filing fees of Presidential candidate without consultation with IPAC or the advisory Committee of the EC. This Institution has demonstrated to us that it’s a weak institution”, he said. Mr. Hassan Ayariga further noted that the EC “can’t just get up from one election to

another increase the filing fee of a 100 percent and you expect the ordinary Ghanaian whose salary is less than GHC 5000 a month to be able to raise an amount of GHC100 thousand to contest for a presidential election. What this mean to me is our multi party participation is not being encouraged because the purpose of EC is to increase multiparty participation”.