FISHESWORLD.COM

Upon his arrival at the Efua Sutherland Children’s Park Thursday for the New Patriotic Party (NPP) final campaign rally, Nana Akufo-Addo, presidential candidate of the NPP was informed by one of his aides that former First Lady, Nana Konadu Agyemang-Rawlings, leader of the National Democratic Party (NDP), had endorsed his candidature for the presidency.

In the course of his speech at the rally, Nana Akufo-Addo expressed his gratitude to leading figures of other political parties, namely Abu Ramadan, National Youth Organiser of the People’s National Convention (PNC), and Nana Agyenim-Boateng (aka Gyataba), National Chairman of United Front Party (UFP), for their expression of support at the rally, and added also that Nana Konadu Agyemang-Rawlings according to his information had also endorsed his candidature.

It transpires that that information was inaccurate and that Nana Konadu had not expressly endorsed his candidature.

Nana Akufo-Addo apologises unreservedly to former First Lady, Nana Konadu Agyemang-Rawlings, and the Ghanaian people for this piece of misinformation and regrets the entire incident.

...signed...

Herbert Krapa

Press Secretary

The National Democratic Congress (NDC) Wednesday rounded up its political campaign for Friday's election, with a declaration by President John Dramani Mahama that God would grant the NDC victory in the election.

He said the victory would be dedicated to the memory of the late President John Evans Atta Mills, who had initiated the Better Ghana agenda and laid the foundation for socio-economic development of the country.

The rally held at the forecourt of the Trade Fair Centre in Accra, was attended by thousands of NDC supporters dressed in the party's colours.

The arrival of President John Dramani Mahama and his wife, Lordina, to the rally ground electrified the atmosphere, with members blowing the vuvuzela and raising their handkerchiefs, NDC flags and umbrellas amidst the shout of 'ede bee keke, one touch'.

President Mahama, who is the presidential candidate of the NDC, walked to the stage in the company of his wife, both of whom were in red tops and black trousers, to greet the ecstatic crowd.

Thereafter, he raised his index finger up to signal one-touch victory for the NDC in the election.

Traders also cashed in to sell the NDC paraphernalia, including T-shirts, caps, hand bands, head gear.

In his address, President Mahama thanked all the foot soldiers and the party executives for the focus and singleness of purpose with which they had conducted "the short but aggressive campaign."

He asked them to maintain the focus and the singleness of purpose as they went into the election by being vigilant on election day.

"Elections are won or lost on the voting day. You have to police the polls, be vigilant and ensure that everything is done according to the law," President Mahama said.

He was optimistic that "if everything is done according to the law, the NDC will win the election."

The President said the government had discharged its duties fully in terms of the provision of resources and financing for the Electoral Commission (EC) to conduct the election.

Besides, he said, the government had supplied the security services with vehicles and communication gadgets to support them to provide security and prevent disturbances during the election.

He, therefore, expressed the hope that the EC would conduct the election in a free, fair and transparent manner.

He again asked the security agencies to provide a peaceful atmosphere for the electorate to cast their ballot.

President Mahama promised to be a unifier, peaceful, humble and listening President since he received such training from President Mills who was his mentor, teacher and father.

He said he would be the needle to sew Ghanaians together, irrespective of political, ethnic or religious affiliations.

On the proposed free education policy of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), President said he wanted to restrict himself to the provision of the 1992 Constitution which calls for efforts to progressively make senior high and tertiary education progressively free.

He said the NDC wanted to ensure quality in the educational sector and make efforts to make education more affordable to parents.

In a brief statement, Vice-President Paa Kwesi Bekoe Amissah Arthur, who arrived from Assin Fosu to the rally ground, said the people of the Central Region had asked him to inform President Mahama that they would give him their votes.

The National Chairman of the NDC, Dr Kwabena Adjei, declared that "God will speak to the people of Ghana on December 7" by giving victory to the NDC.

He asked members of the NDC to ensure that their ballot papers were stamped before voting, because the NPP functionaries had decided not to stamp the ballot papers in strong holds of the NDC.

The General Secretary of the NDC, Mr Johnson Asiedu Nketiah, urged NDC members not to engage in any electoral violence or respond to any provocation.

Rather, he asked members to report any incident to the security personnel since they were mandated to ensure security.

Dr Cadman Mills, brother of the late President Mills, urged Ghanaians to vote for President Mahama, because he and the other family members of the late President Mills had trust in him.

He said the late President Mills had told him that "this is my Vice-President in whom I am pleased."

Dr Cadman Mills described President Mahama as a listener, an enhancer, a synthesiser and an integrator who could continue with the Better Ghana agenda.

The Chairman of the Electoral Commission, Dr Kwadwo Afari-Gyan has said the Commission will declare the results of Friday’s election within 72 hours after the close of poll.

“We normally give ourselves 72 hours to deal completely with what has to be done but in 48 hours, we should know who is winning”, he said.

That was Dr Afari-Gyan speaking at a news conference in Accra to highlight the preparedness of the EC for Friday’s polls.

With just a few hours to go he said “we will not be limited by any timeline to announce the Presidential results, but will work within reasonable time to announce the results”.

He announced that all materials needed for the elections were already on the field, “so we are ready to conduct the elections”.

“From the exercise we did on Tuesday on the Early Voting, we can say we have robust machines for the job”.

The EC chairman said very huge numbers of voters were processed for voting with the verification machines during the Early Voting, “so in our largest polling stations which has 1,100, even there people can be processed for voting”.

Touching on the hiccups of the Early Voting where some security officials were not able to vote because their names were missing from the register, Dr Afari-Gyan said the problem was not with the commission but with the security agencies which failed to submit the particulars of their ID cards and polling stations during the compilation of the list of personnel for the Early Voting and in some cases provided wrong information.

“In the voters register, we do not distinguish between professionals so if we are doing an exercise like this, we rely on information from the various security agencies who compiled the list for us”.

Based on the information provided for us we compiled a list of 29,914 members of the security services.

We asked for ID cards and polling station numbers and if they did not provide us with them, we cannot allow them to vote. There were some cases in which the ID numbers were not correct”, Dr Afari-Gyan said.

The EC chairman said they have held a meeting with the security agencies and it has been agreed that those who were unable to vote should go to their polling stations on Friday to vote.

He said such persons together with media personal who have their accreditation, would be allowed to go ahead of the queue when they go to their polling stations so they can vote early and go back to continue with their official duties on Election Day.