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Gabby: Ghana’s 2008 Election was Flawed

Gabby: Ghana’s 2008 Election was Flawed

Written by danquahinstitute.org Saturday, 21 August 2010 14:16

The Executive Director of the Danquah Institute has said that the 2008 general elections of Ghana had so many flaws and that he fears the country is not showing any serious interest in putting measures in place to avoid that in 2012.

“Even though every vote was seemingly counted not every vote counted in the final analysis. And, if every vote counts then certainly not every vote was properly counted in 2008. Both parties must be blamed; but what are we doing now to cut out that cancer of electoral malpractices from our system for the future? We must wake up now, start thinking and working on it,” he urged all stakeholders.

Addressing the Africa Media & Democracy Conference with an audience of international journalists, academics and NGOs, Mr Gabby Asare Otchere-Darko referred to US President Barrack Obama’s landmark visit to Ghana in July 2009 to “”lift up successful models,” but warned that despite Ghana’s glowing international reputation, “Ghana’s democracy shares more with its neighbours than many would like to admit. Not many of you may know but we got so close to a civil war.”

He said, “Ghana’s 2008 presidential election held the potential to deliver violence instead of peace, anarchy instead of order, regression instead of progression. A military takeover could not even have been ruled out, a point people privy to national security intelligence reports would find difficult to challenge. But, what lessons have we learnt from it as we look ahead to 2012?”

Mr Otchere-Darko called for greater vigilance and positive pressure to ensure that the Electoral Commission applies and receives the necessary impetus and funding to undertake needed reforms, such as a cleaner and credible voter register based on biometric data.

“But, the signs are not good. The way Government has been slow in funding the much-delayed District Assembly elections does not augur well for the critical processes to 2012.”

Speaking on the theme: ‘Informing Responsibly – How the Media Covered Ghana’s 2008 Elections’, Mr Otchere-Darko said, “I find it sad that today we all seem to have forgotten how close a significant section of the media and some political parties got us to killing each other in this country. We’ve forgotten the FM calls that incited foot soldiers to march to the Electoral Commission with cudgels, machetes, sticks and stones. We’ve forgotten the dread that gripped the nation.”

He continued, “We’ve forgotten how election results that had been counted at polling stations changed at collation centres in such a razor thin election results. Surely, we cannot forget how some nine or so neighbouring constituencies in a particular region prosecuted a systematic illegal strategy of preventing polling agents of a particular party from undertaking their functions.”

Mr Otchere-Darko warned that 2012 could take Ghana beyond the brink if the weaknesses that facilitated the electoral fraud, intimidation and violence of 2008 are not resolved.

“Surely, we cannot allow to be entrenched this election culture whereby winners are determined by who is the most ruthlessly efficient out of the two main parties in rigging elections at their respective strongholds. Let us deny them that electoral strategy.”

His fear is that “To have such a large scale electoral violence in Ghana may even be worse than what we saw in Kenya or Zimbabwe because in Ghana, events have shown that no ruling party can say it has a monopoly on the allegiance of the security agents when it comes to elections.”

He added, “Beyond that none of the two main political parties can claim any exclusive illicit rights to rigging, whether in government or opposition.”

There is no guarantee that the main opposition party today will not for 2012 assume the kind of dangerously militant posture and speak the kind of hate language that got Ghana so close to a Kenya, he argued.

“We cannot rule out the possibility of today’s main opposition party assuming an even more militant posture in 2012 than what struck awe and fear in many Ghanaians and international diplomats and observers in December 2008,” the Executive Director of DI said.

He said, the fact of a massively bloated voter register in 2008 gave a legitimate bases for the politicians and their media collaborators to psyche up the Ghanaian public, including their ethno-political sympathisers in the security agencies, that a rival party was planning to or indeed rigging the elections.

The EC said in 2008 that the voter register was probably bloated by some one million names for an election that was decided by less than 41,000 votes.

Mr Otchere-Darko advised that ‘We should not leave it to the politicians for to determine for us the fate of the electoral process and its integrity; we should force it on them because given the chance any political party in any given democracy would rig.”

The Executive Director of the policy think tank said, “Thankfully, Ghana has decided to introduce a biometric voter register for 2012. But, I’m afraid we may not get there if we don’t keep our focus on it and get it done.”

His fear is that without sustained pressure the excuse of lack of funding may be used to frustrate the multi-million dollar biometric registration exercise. Experts put the cost of registering some 12-13 million voters between $20-35 million.

“As at now the District Assembly elections that were to take place in July, then August has no fixed date because the Electoral Commission has not received full funding for it,” he said.

“What is the guarantee that a similar fate may not befall the biometric voter registration, which may require a whole year to implement?” the DI boss remarked.

The EC had hoped to begin a pilot biometric registration this year before starting the full implementation next year, but its budget was significantly slashed.

As a result the District level elections may now take place across the country on October 26 with receipt of nominations for the Unit Committee Elections taking place on August 25 and 26 whilst that of the District Assembly elections may take place on August 28 and 29.

The number of vacancies for the Unit Committees is 160,000 and that for the District Assemblies is 5,000.

An estimated amount of GH¢10, 000,000 was said to have been allocated by the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning for the 2010 District Assembly and Unit Committee elections in December of 2009, which is grossly inadequate for the elections.

The amount is against an expected amount of GH¢67, 000,000 required for the conduct of the said elections by the Electoral Commission (EC) leaving a huge deficit of GH¢57, 000,000.

Mr Otchere-Darko argued that funding for Africa’s democracy cannot be seen as a “compromisable item.”

He told the audience that Ghana may be ahead of the African pack, “But we still have a long road ahead of us and the future of our democracy is by no means certain.”

Mr Otchere-Darko shared a panel with Baffour Ankomah, Editor of the New African Magazine, UK, Nana Serwa Acheampong, and Prof Kwame Karikari. The programme was chaired by Ambassador Kabral Blay-Amihere.

The 3-day conference ‘Mediating Democracy in Africa’ was held at the NIC Conference Hall, Independence Avenue, Accra, from 18-20 August.

It attracted speakers and participants from across the globe.

The founder and director of the Africa Media & Democracy Conference, Barima Adu-Asamoa said a “vibrant and healthy democracy can be sustained and enhanced by a responsible media,” adding, it is important to “examine the manner in which the media impacts on the democratic process. It is in this respect that this conference assumes relevance.”

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