Electoral Commission registered 38,129 voters in Upper West Region
Wa, July 12, GNA - The Electoral Commission (EC) has registered 38,129 people who turned 18 years this year during the Voters Registration Exercise in the Upper West Region, Mr. Mahama Yahaya, Regional Director of EC has said.
He said the Wa Municipality registered the highest figure of 7,595 voters and with 22 challenged cases while the rest of the districts recorded no challenged cases.
The Wa West District registered 4,258 voters, Wa East District 3,397 voters and Nadowli District 4,987 voters.
Others are Jirapa District, 4,101, Lawra District 6,111, Sissala West District 2,324, Sissala East District 2,974 and Lambussie/Karni District 2,382 voters.
Mr Yahaya, in an interview with the Ghana News Agency in Wa on Monday, described the registration exercise as successful attributing it to the non- interference by politicians.
He said the long queues that were experienced in 2008 during the same exercise were absent, he said, adding: "People are now awakening on to their civic rights and responsibilities and so the Electoral Commission's campaign messages were received with great attention".
Mr Yahaya announced that the Voters Register would be exhibited next month and urged all voters who had registered to visit their polling stations to cross-check their names.
This would offer the various voters the opportunity to know where they would be casting their ballots during the District Assembly Elections, he said.
"I want to remind voters that though registration was done at the Electoral Area level, voting would be done at the various polling stations," Mr Yahaya explained.
GNA
EC sets up gender desk
Authorities of Electoral Commission (EC) have established a gender desk in recognition of the importance of women participation in the electoral process, Dr Kwadwo Afari-Gyan, Chairman of EC said on Thursday.
He said in the past, EC on its own initiative and in collaboration with other organisations made efforts to assist women candidates, but the efforts had been ad-hoc and subjected to the availability of extra resources.
Dr Afari-Gyan announced this at the signing of grant contracts funded under the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR) in Accra.
"This is the first time that we are going to have a clearly drawn up programme of considerable duration towards tackling this important problem," he added.
He explained that the drawbacks on women's participation came from various sources and this programme would definitely not address all of them.
"But if knowledge and awareness are, indeed strength, then this project could initiate a process of sustained engagement on the issue of the participation of women in the electoral process and politics generally," he stressed.
Dr Afari-Gyan noted that Ghana was not an exception in the increasing women's voluntary participation in elections and politics particularly in the developing countries was not an easy task and pledged commitment of the EC to take the necessary steps to ensure that the project was properly executed.
Mr Claude Maerten, Head of EU Delegation, said EC and civil society organisations had been playing instrumental role in defending the fundamental freedoms, which formed the basis for all democratic processes and in the development of instruments and advocacy to increase women's participation and representation in politics in Ghana.
He noted that the upcoming district level elections as well as the national Elections in 2012 would however; take place in a particularly challenging environment in which the generation of oil resources would increase the stakes in the electoral contest.
Mr Maerten said additional efforts were required to ensure that elections take place in a peaceful and transparent environment and to increase the representation of women in politics.
He expressed concern about the inadequate representation of women at all levels of government in Ghana adding "The number of women in Parliament has fallen compared to the number of women in the previous Parliament".
"A situation in which women, who constitute about 51 per cent of the total population, occupy less than 10 per cent of the seats in Parliament cannot be considered fair," he added.
Mr Maerten observed that one of the most important lessons from Election 2008, was the importance to increase women's representation in politics and thus to facilitate their participation in the electoral process.
GNA