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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.
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.
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.”
He expressed the hope that the December 7 polls would also be peaceful to ensure victory for the NPP.
From Kumasi, Emmanuel Baah reports that the special voting for the presidential and parliamentary elections was smooth in the Ashanti Region yesterday as a total of 20,922 registered voters were expected to cast their ballots.
As of 12 noon, 393 voters had cast their ballots at the Central Police Canteen 'A' and 'B' centres in the Subin Constituency in Kumasi, where 690 voters were expected at each centre.
However, the story was different in the Offinso North Constituency in the Ashanti Region where voting was delayed till after 9 a.m.
According to the Electoral Commission officials at the centre, the voters’ register was not among the materials that were delivered to them last Sunday so they had to send for the register from Kumasi to be able to start the exercise at the centre, where 566 persons were expected to cast their votes.
From Wa, Kwadwo Baffoe Donkor reports that the special voting place smoothly in the Wa Central Constituency of the Upper West Region yesterday, with a few challenges.
The Presiding Officer, Dr Joseph K. Wulifan, said with the exception of one lady who was verified manually, there was no major challenge.
He said the machine could neither read the lady’s biometric nor identify her facially, “so the machine directed that she should be identified manually and we proceeded to fill the manual form to enable her to vote.”
Aside from that, two people could not find their names in the register and, “upon further interrogation, we realised that they did not apply to vote in the special voting.”
Voting started at exactly 7 a.m. at the Wa Circuit Court for voters, with a total of 967 voters being expected to take part in the exercise.
As of 8.30 a.m., 142 voters had cast their ballots at polling stations A and B.
At Polling Station A, 58 voters had cast their ballots, while 84 people had voted at Polling Station B.
Alberto Mario Noretti reports from Ho that the special voting exercise took off smoothly at the three centres on the premises of the Electoral Commission (EC) yesterday as some voters turned up at the venue as early as 3 a.m., quite eager to cast their votes.
When the Daily Graphic arrived at the venue soon after 7 a.m., there were queues at the three centres and voting was underway.
The Presiding Officer at Centre A, Raymond Akposoe, said voting took off smoothly without any hitch.
He said as of 8 a.m., 34 out of the 520 registered voters had exercised their franchise.
Similarly, at Centre B, voting took off on schedule with all the voting materials readily available.
The Presiding Officer, Samuel Kosipe, said as of 7:50 a.m., 59 people out of the registered 525 had voted.
At Centre C, voting was equally smooth and swift and 65 people had dropped their ballot papers into the ballot box as of 8:12 a.m.
The Presiding Officer, Mawutor Amaglo, said a remarkable number of the voters turned up at the centre at dawn.
The Municipal Electoral Officer, Emelia Akortia, said the queues were expected to ease after midday.
“So far, there has not been any untoward incident, and we do not expect any,” she added.
The atmosphere at the three centres was calm and the security personnel on duty carried no weapons.
From Cape Coast, Shirley Asiedu-Addo reports that the special voting in the Cape Coast North Constituency was smooth at the Ghana National Fire Service Headquarters.
The Presiding Officer, Dr David Kofi Ampah, said voting began at 7 a.m. with all materials available as one person waited to cast his vote.
Voters cast their votes smoothly and left the polling centre almost immediately after voting.
In all, 597 voters were expected to vote at the centre, and as of 11 a.m., 180 persons had already voted.
The parliamentary candidate of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Mr Ekow Horace Ewusi, who monitored the process, described it as smooth and peaceful, adding that he was hopeful there would be no disruptions.
The National Democratic Congress (NDC) parliamentary candidate for Cape Coast North, Kwamina Mintah Nyarkoh, told the media that the process had been smooth and peaceful.
Gilbert Mawuli Agbey reports from Bolgatanga that the special voting exercise commenced smoothly at all the centres in the Upper East Region.
A total of 7,080 voters were expected to cast their votes in the special voting.
Despite early morning gunshots in the Bawku Municipality, the eligible electorate defied the incident to cast their votes.
As of 10 a.m. in the Bongo Constituency, more than 100 voters had already cast their votes, although a total of 603 people were expected to exercise their franchise.
The Presiding Officer at the Bongo Special Voting Centre, Martin Asanyuure, said in an interview that the process was smooth.
From Sunyani, Biiya Mukusah Ali reports that a total of 6,473 registered special voters in the Bono Region were expected to participate in the special voting exercise in 14 special voting centres across the 12 constituencies.
As of 11a.m. when the Daily Graphic monitored some of the centres, voting was going on smoothly and peacefully in the region.
The Electoral Commission (EC) created two different centres at Sunyani East and Wenchi to speed up the voting process.
At the Bono Regional Police Headquarters where the Sunyani East special voting took place, a total of 1,137 special voters, made up of security personnel, media and EC officials, were expected to vote.
At the Wenchi Constituency, 842 registered special voters were expected to cast their votes at two centres — "A" and "B".
Centre "A" had 435 special voters, while Centre "B" had 421 voters.
Mohammed Fugu reports from Tamale that the special voting exercise went on smoothly at four centres in Tamale, the Northern Regional capital, yesterday.
The centres were Jubilee Park, Kalipohini Senior High School, the EC office and Kamina Barracks.
As of 9.30 a.m., more than 180 voters had cast their votes at each of the centres.
A total of 7,342 voters were expected to participate in the special voting exercise across the region.
Speaking to the media, the Northern Regional Director of Electoral Commission, Lucas Yiryil, expressed satisfaction with the conduct of the exercise.
“Everything is going on smoothly and we have not recorded any incidents," he said.
He added that all the centres were fully equipped with the necessary logistics to ensure a seamless process.
By 3:30 p.m., 365 eligible voters had cast their ballots at the Tema Community Eight Police Station, which was the polling station for the Tema Central Constituency special voting exercise, reports Benjamin Xornam Glover.
The centre has a total of 457 eligible voters.
The Returning Officer of the Constituency, Kwesi Brobbey, told the Daily Graphic that voting had been smooth with no major incident recorded.
