Share the post "Volta Regional Chairman Of PNC Sues EC, AG Over New Voters Register"
The Volta Regional Chairman of the Peoples National Convention (PNC), Cecil Rhodes Dogbe, has sued the Electoral Commission (EC) and the Attorney General, Gloria Akuffo, over the attempt to exclude the existing voters’ register from the list of eligible documents that can be used to register onto the new voters roll that the EC wants to compile.
A notice of motion has fixed the 19th of June for the case to be moved after the case was filed on the 5th of June by Mr. Dogbe.
According to the plaintiff, the Electoral Commission’s decision to exclude the voters’ ID card from the list of eligible documents for registration onto the new register violates his fundamental right as a citizen.
This he says is because he bears only the voters ID card as a form of identity as a citizen eligible to register and vote. He got the cards legally under article 42 and CI 91 and therefore the EC’s attempt to disenfranchise him is unconstitutional.
He also brands the EC’s action as unreasonable and unjustifiable.
For the Attorney General, her inclusion in the suit is because she forwarded the draft Constitutional Instrument (CI) to Parliament and advised the EC to liaise with the Clerk of the Parliamentary Committee on Subsidiary Legislation to commit to the process of preparing the new CI for laying before Parliament.
He prays the court to declare that the EC’s move to make only the passport and the Ghana Card the acceptable documents for registering onto the new register, excluding the all other forms of identification as evidence of citizenship is invalid and unacceptable.
He wants the court to enforce his right to vote with the existing voters’ ID card because he secured it under Article 42.
Interestingly the suit by Mr. Dogbe is coming at a time that the opposition NDC is at the Supreme Court challenging the EC over the same issue of the intended exclusion of the voters’ ID card from the list of acceptable documents for registration onto the new register and the decision to compile a new voters’ register at all.