Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, the Majority Leader, has voiced his concerns on the Electoral Commission’s (EC) plan to make the Ghana Card the exclusive form of voter registration for the 2024 elections.
Relying only on the Ghana Card for voter registration would be premature, according to Mr. Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, who cited the continued difficulties with the National Identification Authority’s (NIA) Ghana Card issuance.
He noted that some qualified voters who have registered for the card are still waiting to obtain it, and that many eligible voters have not yet received their cards.
Mr. Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu noted that the EC’s initial decision to link voter registration for the District Level Elections (DLE) to the Ghana Card had faced criticism due to the exclusion of eligible voters who lacked the card. He reiterated that making the Ghana Card the sole document for voter registration would create similar issues.
“So many people don’t have the Ghana card and some of the people who have registered to get the card have not been given the card. And given the pendency of the District Level Elections (DLE) to have tied registration to the Ghana card knowing that some of the eligible Ghanaians have not been registered to get the Ghana cards…to say that you were restricting it to the Ghana card was going to be problematic.”
“If they can assure that every eligible Ghanaian will be provided with the Ghana card then you can bring the instrument based on the Ghana card. But if you admit that not every eligible Ghanaian has been registered or can be registered then it becomes difficult to tie the registration solely to the Ghana card,” he stated.
