The Coalition of Domestic Election Observers (CODEO) has condemned the incidence of vote-buying in the Assin North by-election held on Tuesday.
There were accusations and counter-accusations of vote buying between the New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the National Democratic Congress (NDC) in the just-ended by-election.
Leading members of both party’s have since denied the allegations of vote buying.
However, the National Coordinator of CODEO, Albert Kofi Arhin, in an interview said such acts ought to be nipped in the bud to safeguard the country’s democracy.
“I heard a lot of people talking about money exchanging hands, being given to voters and that’s a very bad sign.
It’s been happening and people have been talking about it and if we are not careful this will destroy the democracy that we are building.”
“How can you give money to a voter to cast a ballot for you?
It is surely a bad sign, so I think both politicians and voters need to look at this and find solutions to it because it is not good for our democracy,” he stated.
Arrest
In a related development, the Director of Advocacy and Policy Engagement at the Ghana Centre for Democratic Development (CDD-Ghana), Dr Kojo Pumpuni Asante, who was part of the team that observed the by-election, for his part suggested that in future elections the Police and the Office of the Special Prosecutor should deploy under cover personnel to arrest people involved in vote buying.
Then, he said, if people were arrested it would send a signal that it was an offence, adding that they should be also prosecuted to serve as a deterrent to others.
He said voters taking money from politicians to vote did not increase the cost of the election but bred corruption in government.
Dr Asante commended the security personnel for the high sense of professionalism exhibited during the election.
ObserversThe CODEO deployed 15 observers for the just ended by-election.
The deployment, it said, was in fulfilment of its mandate to mobilise citizens to actively participate in the electoral process and to complement the efforts of the Electoral Commission in ensuring a transparent, free, fair and peaceful by-election.