The opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) has expressed fears over the Electoral Commission’s (EC) planned declaration of the presidential results of the 2020 elections by the close of day today, Tuesday, December 8, 2020.
The NDC believes the failure of the EC to tabulate certified results from the constituencies that are trickling in at the national level smacks of a grand scheme to rig the election in favour of the New Patriotic Party (NPP).
Ghanaians are looking forward to the Electoral Commission to declare the winner in 24 hours as promised following the certification of constituency results of the presidential race.
But at its fourth election press briefing organized today, General Secretary of the NDC, John Asiedu Nketia, said the lack of commitment from the EC to begin imputing data at its National Collation Centre in real-time together with the late start of the process makes the transparency of the final results questionable.
“Normally, the results keep trickling in as and when they are declared on the field. We are worried that as at now, there are some regional offices where collation has not started at all when the same Commission’s returning officers have declared the results in the various constituencies. Why is that the collation has not started and the EC still insists that they will be declaring the results two hours from now. Transparency requires that as and when the results begin to trickle in, they are certified and made available to the public so that everyone can follow the trend of the results. We are not going to sit down for the EC to compile results in all the so many polling stations throughout the country and to announce the bulk figure to the nation when there is no basis for cross-checking”, he said.
According to Mr. Nketia, information available to the NDC from the National Collation Centre suggests the collation of the results commenced a short while ago contrary to the best electoral practices.
“At least by now, we should have gone more than half of the presidential results. So that even as we wait for those that have not been counted yet, there will be sufficient time for us to be scrutinizing what has been certified. Our officers from the National collation just indicated to us that the results have just started tricking in less than one hour ago. What has been happening between 5 pm and now such that this competent EC couldn’t have certified results of the constituencies as far as the Commission has not started any process of collation at all at the regional level? So what is happening”, he quizzed.
While calling on stakeholders to ensure that the electoral management body does the right thing, the NDC has therefore reiterated its resolve not to accept the results of a flawed electoral process.
“We want to call on the international community, peace-loving Ghanaians, the traditional authorities to urge the EC to do the right thing and to warn the Commission that any false step will come along with serious consequences”, Asiedu Nketia cautioned.
