The Electoral Commission (EC) has challenged Former President John Dramani Mahama to provide evidence to back his recent series of ‘false’ allegations against the Commission concerning the 2020 general elections.
The claims are that the Commission; stuffed one million thumb printed ballots into ballot boxes in favour of the New Patriotic Party (NPP); was influenced by the military in the result declaration and announcement; was responsible for the Techiman election violence while the election was fraudulent.
The Deputy EC Chairman in-charge of Corporate Services, Dr Eric Asare Bossman,addressing the Let the Citizens Know media engagement in Accra yesterday also called on the Ghana Police Service to investigate the allegations.
“We are of the view that our silence on these false allegations would have dire consequences as it would undermine citizens’ confidence in the electoral body,” he said.
The engagement was to review the 2020 elections and address matters arising including the allegations by Former President Mahama who was the flagbearer for the National Democratic Congress (NDC) in the election.
The former president lost the election to the incumbent President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo as well as an election petition at the Supreme Court. The allegations were reportedly made during his recent ‘thank you tours’ to part of the country.
On the ballot stuffing allegations, Dr Asare said, the transparency of the process made it impossible because empty ballot boxes were opened and displayed at the polling station in the presence of all including the party agents with votes and voters cross-checking to ensure there was no over voting.
He said in all the polling stations, the commission had no challenges with over voting in presidential elections, except in the parliamentary election in Savelugu where there was only one case of over-voting.
He said no where did the military influence the declaration of the results as the process was participatory and the results were the true reflection of the will of the people.
This, he said, was corroborated by media, local and international observers whose collated resulted were same as those of the EC declared.
Dr Asare also refuted allegations by the Former President that the polls was the worst in the history of the country and fraudulent, explaining that it had been hailed as fair, transparent and credible by global observers.
He said despite allegations of rigged elections, the NDC could not provide evidence to back their claim when it had the opportunity to do so during the election petition.
On the Techiman violence, he said, it was not cause by EC officials given that they were not in charge of security.
He said the EC chairperson, Jean Mensa was not running way from accountability as claimed by the former president because the EC was accountable to the citizenry through the special budget committee of parliament, which it has done.
Ms Mensa, thanked all stakeholders for their collaboration which led to a successful election despite the COVID-19 pandemic.
BY JONATHAN DONKOR
