EC Welcomes Supreme Court’s Ruling on Voters’ Register, Affirms June 30 for Register Compilation

Ghana’s Electoral Commission (EC) has welcomed the Supreme Court’s ruling which upholds the Commission’s decision to refuse existing voter ID cards and birth certificates, as a form of identification for the upcoming mass registration exercise.

The Supreme Court today [June 25, 2020] further upheld that the EC has the authority granted under Article 45 of the 1992 Constitution to compile an electoral roll.

The opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) had earlier, in a legal suit against the EC, invoked the original jurisdiction of the Supreme Court to interpret the constitution with a case that it was unconstitutional for the EC to reject an existing voters ID as a prerequisite for the upcoming voter registration exercise.

A private citizen, Mark Takyi-Banson also asked the Court to declare as unconstitutional the exclusion of the birth certificate from the list of documents a qualified voter can rely on to enroll onto the electoral roll.

However, the Supreme Court dismissed the two suits against the EC by upholding the Constitutional Instrument ( C.I 126) to be used in the compilation of the new register.

READ ALSO:
NDC vs EC: [Full Text] Supreme Court’s Ruling On New Voters’ Register Case

The EC in a statement today again spelt out the provision of the C.I 126

“For avoidance of doubt CI 126 spells out the requirement for proof of identification for the purposes of this registration;

3. ‘A person who applies for registration as a voter shall provide as evidence of identification one of the following:

•  A passport
•  A National Identification Card issued by the National Identification Authority; or
• One voter registration identification guarantee form  as set out in Form One of Schedule, that has been completed and signed by two registered voters”

The EC assured the general public that the registration exercise will commence on June 30 to August 6 as earlier announced.

Read EC's Statement Below