The New Patriotic Party (NPP) has reiterated its commitment to organise a free, fair and transparent election on August 7, 2010, to elect a flagbearer to lead the party in the 2012 general elections.
According to the party, all the knotty issues that had been raised regarding the expanded electoral college elections had all been resolved and “so we are going into Saturday’s contest satisfied that we have made the grounds as fair and even as humanly possible” and thanked the aspirants for their vigilance and co-operation.
Mr Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey, the Chairman of the party, said this during a press conference on the forth-coming election in Accra yesterday. Present at the meeting were the Chairman of the Election Committee of the party, Mr C. K. Tedam and the General Secretary and S. O. Solomon, a member of the election committee.
He commended Mr Alan Kyerematen and Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo for contributing extra resources for the transportation of delegates from their homes to their polling centres.
He also debunked claims by Professor Kwabena Frempong-Boateng that the elections would not be free and fair because the executive of the party were manipulating the elections to favour a particular person and said there was no way that could happen.
He said although in recent weeks the work load involved and the difficulty in building and verifying information from the constituencies had created some misunderstanding and even suspicion, there was no way the national executive would influence the over 100,000 delegates in the 230 constituencies in the country or knead the process to the advantage of a particular candidate.
The National Chairman said per the tradition of the NPP, the August 7 Congress would be conducted by the Electoral Commission (EC) in all polling centres, and will collate and give the final tally of votes obtained by each candidate.
He said apart from Ablekuma North and Ablekuma South Constituencies where certain outstanding issues were yet to be resolved, the election would be conducted in all 230 constituencies, thus almost 113,000 delegates were expected to vote in the congress.
He explained that this delegate size was smaller than earlier figures put out and the reduction had resulted from the elimination of delegates who were unable to vote and also, from the merging of positions that overlap within the electoral college defined in Article 12(A)6 of the NPP Constitution, since each delegate can only vote once. Each constituency shall represent a unit polling area and polling centre.
Mr Obetsebi-Lamptey said the National Council of Elders, the National Council, past national officers and representatives of the external branches will all vote at the National Headquarters in Asylum Down, while all other delegates would vote in the constituency where their membership was registered.
He said voting at all polling centres will begin at 8.00a.m. and close at 3.00p.m. on the voting day, with counting following immediately, while the EC was expected to declare the results at the Efua Sutherland Children's Park in Accra and in the event of an outright win, the winning candidate would then be declared by the National Chairman of the Party.
He said the party had also completed security arrangements and was in continuing discussions with the security services to ensure that adequate protection was provided for the entire congress.
Mr Obetsebi-Lamptey said as its commitment to transparency, the congress would be opened to both the electronic and print media. However, any media person who wanted access to any voting premise shall be required to show proof that he or she had been assigned by a recognised media house to cover the exercise.
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