The Electoral Commission (EC) begins the nationwide Special Voting exercise today. This allows election officials, security personnel, and media practitioners to cast their ballots early ahead of the December 7 general election.
Initially planned for 328 centres, the exercise in the Western and Eastern Regions has been rescheduled to Thursday, December 5, 2024, due to a recall of ballots.
With 131,478 eligible voters representing 0.007% of the total voter population of 18.7 million, the polls will run from 7 am to 5 pm.
“We are ready to conduct transparent, credible, and peaceful elections,” assured EC Chairperson Jean Mensa told the press last Friday.
Mrs Jean Mensa clarified that security personnel and journalists who did not apply for Special Voting will not be able to vote on December 2 but can participate in the main election scheduled for December 7.
She emphasized that ballots cast during the Special Voting exercise will not be counted immediately. Instead, they will be tallied on December 7 at the Constituency Collation Centres and then added to the main election results.
At each Constituency Collation Centre, the Returning Officer will separately record these results on the Presidential and Parliamentary Election Results Collation Forms before merging them with the overall tally from all polling stations.
To ensure the security of the ballots, all boxes will be sealed and stored in secured rooms at police stations within each constituency.
The EC has instructed Presiding Officers not to count Special Voting ballots on the day they are cast.
Dr George Akuffo Dampare, Inspector-General of Police and chair of the National Elections Security Taskforce, reassured the public that robust security measures are in place to guarantee a peaceful and safe electoral process.
The general elections to elect a new president and 276 MPs will take place on Saturday, December 7, 2024.
In other trending news…
Western and Eastern Regions will not take part in Monday’s special voting on December 2 following an incident that has forced the Electoral Commission to order a recall and a reprinting of ballots for the two regions.
For the 2024 general election, there are 328 special voting centres across the country and 131,478 voters on the special voting list.
The Electoral Commission has ordered a recall and reprinting of ballot papers for the Eastern and Western Regions after a leakage was detected with the initial ballot papers.
The Commission’s Chairperson, Jean Mensa announced this at an emergency news conference on Sunday, December 1.
According to the Commission, this has become necessary after it was informed by National Security that a single defaced paper was taken out of Checkpoint Printing Limited Printing House.
The defaced paper was earmarked for destruction but unfortunately found its way out of the firm which has been working with the Commission since 1992.
The reprinting will be done by BuckPress and Innolink.
As a result, it announced the suspension of the special voting exercise which is due to start tomorrow, Monday, for the two regions whose ballot papers were printed by Checkpoint Printing Limited Printing House.
The two regions will have their special voting on Thursday, December 5, before the general election on Saturday, December 7.
It says the security features of ballots for the two regions will be enhanced to differentiate them from the ones that have gone out.
The Commission said the total recall is to ensure the integrity of the election.
It says all parties and contestants in the election have been informed of the development and have agreed to the recall and reprinting.
Before this incident, the EC similarly reprinted ballot papers for Ahafo and the Volta Region due to some errors with the initial printing.
The Commission has also detected some shortfall in the ballot papers dispatched to some regions and is working to fix the anomaly.
