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Disregard NDC’s lies of overprinting ballot papers, says EC

The NDC has alleged that the Electoral Commission (EC) has secretly increased the number of ballot papers being printed for the election

The Electoral Commission (EC) has described as “misleading” allegations by the National Democratic Congress (NDC) that it’s overprinting ballot papers aimed at rigging the 7 December election.

In a statement, the EC said: “The NDC alleges that the Commission has secretly increased the number of ballot papers being printed by the Assembly Press Limited, one of the printing houses selected to print the 2020 ballots.

“This is untrue and we entreat the public to disregard this falsehood,” the EC added.

Professor Joshua Alabi, campaign manager of the NDC, alleged that the EC had printed excess of 150,000 ballot papers in a bid to rig the polls for the incumbent, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) and President Akufo-Addo.

Alabi alleged that the EC is printing ballot papers exceeding more than 5% which, according to him, will affect the transparency of the elections.

He said “By convention and practice, the EC prints an extra 5% t of the total registered papers to cater for spoilt ballots at each polling station. What is surprising this time around is that the EC is printing an additional 5% of the total registered voter per a constituency with padding in the total number of ballot papers to be printed. What is translated into is that more ballot papers are being printed in excess of the 5% extra ballot papers required for each polling station.”

Alabi added, “From the ballot statistics received from the printing houses as coming from the EC, we have analysed the figures from 13 regions and observed that there is an excess of over 150,000 ballot papers being printed beyond the extra 5% required.”

The NDC further accused Assembly Press, contracted to print the ballot papers, of secretly printing additional ballot papers in another location on the blind side of party agents monitoring the process.

“Just last night, the NDC found out that the Assembly Press is printing additional ballot papers in another location at the premises of the agency on the blind side of the political parties,” the NDC said.

But the EC said it finds it “difficult to understand why the NDC would seek to cause fear and apprehension around a transparent and open process such as the printing of ballots. This is unacceptable,” the statement said.

The Electoral Commission (EC) has therefore assured the citizenry it will account for each ballot paper in the lead up to 7 December.

“Not one ballot paper will be included in a package that has not been accounted for. This will not happen. Our processes are open, transparent, and robust and will remain so,” it said.

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