New voters registration a recipe for chaos - Bernard Mornah

The National Chairman of the People’s National Convention (PNC), Bernard Mornah, has said the compilation of a new voters’ register for the 2020 general elections is a recipe for chaos.

“It was strange that the police picked me up because I had said that the EC’s intransigence to compile a new voters’ register and their inordinate desire to exclude the majority of Ghanaians from the register and saying that if we put our resistance,

we will be beaten at the registration centres. And so I said no one should tell us that they are going to beat us and that we are going to beat each other at the registration centre and if the beatings escalate, it will lead to killing each other and by the actions

and the steps the EC is taking could plunge this country into a disaster. There will be chaos and confusion which chaos will lead to beating each other.” “So there will be beatings at the registration centres if the Electoral Commission insists and goes ahead with this exercise that I feel is a recipe for chaos,” he said.

Mr Mornah made these comments on Citi TV‘s current affairs program The Point of View on Wednesday, June 10, 2020. The PNC National Chairman was invited and interrogated by the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the

Ghana Police Service last week over some claims he made with regards to the yet to be compiled new voters’ register deemed to be threats against the Electoral Commission.

“People who are already Ghanaians and already registered are going to be taken out of the voters’ register. Don’t think confusion will come at the registration station, but if confusion comes there, you think the EC staff will be safe?

We will beat each other there and we will kill each other there if that is what the EC wants to lead this nation to,” Mr. Mornah is quoted to have said at a press conference organized by the Inter-Party Resistance Against New Register (IPRAN) on May 26, 2020, thus warranting the CID interrogation.

Background

The Electoral Commission is set to compile a new voters’ register for the upcoming 2020 general elections. Some Ghanaians and political parties are opposed to the move.

The EC has also faced opposition to the new register because of its decision to remove the current voters’ ID card from the list of documents needed to register to vote.

Parliament gives EC green light to compile new voters register

Parliament on Tuesday voted to allow the Electoral Commission (EC) to use the Ghana Card and Passports as the only forms of identification for persons registering to vote.

The House voted in a 102 to 96 decision in favour of the amendment of the Constitutional Instrument empowering the EC to organise elections in the country.

The EC presented the Public Election (Amendment) Regulation, 2020 (C.I. 126) to Parliament to amend C.I 91 in order to change the current identification requirements.

EC sets June 30 to start new voter registration exercise

Following the green light, the Electoral Commission has set Tuesday, June 30, 2020, to begin the compilation of the new voters’ register. A statement from the EC said the exercise will be held at all registration centres and district its offices nationwide.