The special voting exercise organised by the Electoral Commission (EC) for various personnel who will be on duty during the December 7 elections went on smoothly and almost unnoticed in the capital, Accra on Monday, report Daniel Kenu, Joshua Bediako Koomson and Pacome Emmanuel Damalie.
The atmosphere at the various polling stations — mainly police stations — that the Daily Graphic visited was quiet as representatives of the various political parties observed the exercise with keen interest.
A little over 114,000 voters, excluding 17,000 from the Western and the Eastern regions, were expected to cast their ballots across the 276 constituencies nationwide yesterday.
The ballots cast would be securely stored at the various police stations and added to the general election results on December 7.
At the Legon Police Station in the Ayawaso West Wuogon Constituency and the Nima Police Station in Ayawaso East, 467 and 298 people respectively cast their ballots.
The presiding officers of the two constituencies, Derrick Agyekum and Samuel Anim Ofori, expressed satisfaction at the turn of events.
“These are mainly middle-class people so we are not likely to record any negative happenings. Moreso, this is a police station so no one can come and mess around,” Mr Agyekum told the Daily Graphic team.
“The political party representatives have been very cooperative,” Mr Ofori said.
At the Klottey Korle Constituency, where there were two polling stations at the Osu Police Station, one-third of the voters had cast their ballots by 10 a.m., while 1,229 voters were billed to vote.
Unlike the Legon and Nima Police stations, security was quite heavy at the Osu Police Station for reasons that were not immediately known.
At Osu, some sympathisers of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) were present, aside from their party representatives, which could account for the security reinforcement.
EC officials
At the time of the visit, 200 out of 615 personnel had cast their votes.
“We are not sure we will have a 100 per cent voter turnout, but the process has been very smooth so far. There has been no difficulty or challenge with any of the devices,” the presiding officer for Osu Police Station Polling Station ‘B’, Efua Kitson-Amoah, told the Daily Graphic.
Her statement was corroborated by the presiding officer for Polling Station ‘A’, Kofi Aboagye.
MPs
In an interview, Dr Agyeman-Rawlings expressed satisfaction at the voting process, describing it as “very smooth and orderly,” and hoped that it would be replicated on December 7.
She was optimistic that voters would allow their conscience to guide them as they cast their votes.
“I am happy about the transparency so far. I know that some elements are trying to influence votes by giving them money before they come to the polling station, but I think this is a vote of conscience.
“People will not be deceived because they know what their living conditions have been over the last eight years,” Dr Agyeman-Rawlings stated.
For his part, the NPP parliamentary candidate, Mr Nortey, expressed satisfaction at the Electoral Commission’s work at the polling station, saying, “The process so far is perfect and I rate the
EC more than 100 per cent; they were here on time and everything is going on smoothly.”