The Electoral Commission (EC) has hit back at the President of IMANI Africa, Franklin Cudjoe on his claim that the Commission disenfranchised the people of Santrokofi, Apkafu, Lolobi and Lipke (SALL Residents) from voting in the 2020 parliamentary elections.
According to the EC, their outfit didn’t in any way prevent the people of SALL from exercising their voting rights in 2020. In a statement released today, May 15, 2024, the EC denied the claim of IMANI, citing it as one that lacked basis.
“The Commission never disenfranchised the good people of the newly created Guan Constituency. It is not in our interest to do so. We wish to state that the accusations are false and without basis,” the EC said in a statement on Wednesday.
Furthermore, it blamed the inability to conduct the 2020 elections in SALL on the parliamentary recess at the time and the timing of the proposal from the Ministry of Local Government for the creation of a Guan constituency for residents of SALL.
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“The Commission was not aware that Parliament was on recess at the time it received the letter from the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development requesting it to create a new Constituency. As a result, the Commission drafted a Constitutional Instrument (C.I.) to bring into force the Guan Constituency and forwarded the draft C.I. to the Attorney General’s Department for its review on the 13th of November, 2020,” it said while attaching correspondence of its communication with the Ministry of Local Government in the statement it released.
INABILITY OF SALL (GUAN CONSTITUENCY) TO VOTE IN THE 2020
PARLIAMENTARY ELECTION- DISREGARD FALSEHOOD AND
MISINFORMATION FROM IMANI PRESIDENT pic.twitter.com/I8tC9qmDgi— Electoral Commission Of Ghana (@ECGhanaOfficial) May 15, 2024
The C.I. for the creation of the Guan constituency for residents of SALL was only laid in Parliament in November 2023, three years after the 2020 elections, leaving residents there without parliamentary representation.
