EC Can’t Make Ghana Card Sole Citizenship ID For Voters’ Register – Parliament Says
The use of the Ghana card as the only form of identification required to be registered in the new voter’s register was rejected by Parliament on Friday. Before the commission could bring the Public Elections (Registration of Voters) Regulation, 2023 for discussion, the House overwhelmingly recommended that it include the guarantor system.
Lawmakers believed that utilizing the Ghana Card as the only method of voter registration would have a negative effect on the electoral roll and prevent some otherwise eligible people from registering to vote until the issues relating to the issuance of the Ghana Card were resolved.
Before enacting such a requirement, they advised the EC to wait patiently until every eligible voter had the chance to register and obtain a Card.
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Report acceptance Following the adoption of the Committee of the Whole report on the draft constitutional document by the legislature, the House made its choice. The report, which was authored by the Speaker of the House and Chairman of the Committee of the Whole, Alban Sumana Kingsford Bagbin, stated that it was not yet appropriate for the EC to introduce and implement the Ghana card as the sole method of proving citizenship for the purposes of voter registration.
First Deputy Speaker Joseph Osei-Owusu delivered the report to the House and made the motion for the adoption of the committee’s findings. The reports reflected the worries expressed by lawmakers on both sides of the aisle at earlier sessions of the Special Budget Committee and the Committee of the Whole with Jean Mensa, Chairman of the EC, Prof.
Ken Ofori-Atta, the finance minister, and Ken Attafuah.
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It was based on the idea that the EC could only submit the new C.I to Parliament for approval and discussion if it accorded the MPs’ concerns favorable treatment willing to back reforms.
The report said MPs, having thoroughly interrogated the issues and reforms being contemplated by the EC, were ready to support any effort that would enable every Ghanaian to get a Ghana Card because it was the law.
However, it stated that any attempt to force the EC to utilize the Ghana Card as the exclusive method of determining a person’s eligibility to vote in the 2024 elections will be rejected by legislators.
It, it claimed, rested on the assumption that Ghana had matured and could now boast of a reliable national identification card (Ghana Card) to use for business transactions.
The statement continued, “Yet, even in the face of a number of identification alternatives provided in the past and even in the operation of the NIA, some citizens are unable to register for the national card due to the existence of major obstacles the authority is faced with.”
