EC announces 8 measures to guarantee ballot credibility on election day

Ghana’s Electoral Commission has issued an eight-point measures it will put in place on December 7 to “guarantee the credibility of the ballots” when millions of Ghanaians vote to elect a president and 275 members of parliament.

Chairperson of the Commission, Mrs Charlotte Osei announced the measures at a dialogue with the seven presidential candidates Thursday in Accra.

Below are the eight measures put in place by the EC

1. Ballot issuers are required to hold up each ballot paper issued for scrutiny of all at the Polling Station and to ensure its validation before handing over to the voter.

2. Polling Stations will be set up in a standardized manner that minimizes security threats, improves transparency, ensures that agents are placed in positions that allow them to play their roles effectively and protects the secrecy of the ballot.

3. All Presiding Officers will be issued with gloves which must be worn before sorting of ballots and counting.

4. Presiding Officers and Returning Officers will issue copies of collation sheets to Candidates/Agents.

5. Results Collation Sheets have unique serial numbers and are personalized to each Polling Station. Replacement Results Collation Sheets printed for use in the event of damage or loss of the personalized Results Collation sheets are a different colour and also have unique serial numbers.

6. Electronic transmission of the results to be implemented by the Commission is an added layer of integrity to the process. The Electronic Results Transmission System is also encrypted, making it impossible for anyone to interfere with or manipulate the results.

7. The colour of the indelible ink will be different from the ink on the thumbprint pad. This is to help reduce the number of rejected ballots resulting from accidental markings on the ballot papers from indelible ink on fingers.

8. In addition to broadcasting the results collation process live on television, and publishing the results on the Commission’s website, the EC has developed a mobile application which will give the public real-time access to the officially certified results. The mobile app (ThumbsApp) will soon be available on the android and IOS platforms for download.

Source: http://3news.com