Our doors are open for discussions with EC —Togbe Afede
The President of the National House of Chiefs, Togbe Afede XIV, has indicated that, the House is opened to the Electoral Commission (EC) for discussions on the compilation of the new voters’ register as all attempts by House to meet the Commission proved futile.
According to Togbe Afede, the House scheduled to meet officials of the EC on February 5, as well as another date scheduled at the end of February, but the Commission failed to meet the House on the basis of tight schedule of the Commission during that month.
Disclosing this at the first General Meeting of the House on Friday, Togbe Afede, explained that, the House’s request to meet the EC followed a petition from the Inter-Party Resistance against New Voters’ Register earlier in the year.
“Nananom, it is unfortunate that, the EC was not able to come as we requested, more unfortunate is the fact that in their response to our letter, they claimed their programme for the whole of February was too full for them to be able to come and see Nananom, we had requested for them to meet us on February 5, 2020 and they stated they did not have any time to meet us in February”, Togbe Afede disclosed.
He added, “The Standing Committee requested the registrar to write to them and ask them for any day in this month (March) that they found suitable so we can assemble to meet them, but as at today, we have not heard from them.”
Togbe Afede added that, efforts to get the Ashanti Regional officials of the Commission to meet the House also proved futile.
The President, however, emphasised that, it was important that, all institutions or organisations in the country that were independent appreciated that, they did not have absolute powers and that, everything that they did affected the entire population of the country and so whatever they did must be in the best interest of the country.
He indicated that, the overall concern of Nananom was the peace and unity of the country ahead of the December 2020 general election and urged the government, EC, opposition parties, Civil Society Organisations to be circumspect in their utterances.
FROM FAUSTINA KWABEA OSEI, KUMASI