Over 17 million voters on final voters' register - EC

The EC dismissed allegations of deliberately exempting qualified voters from participating in the December 7 polls

Nov 30, 2020 - 10:40 Updated: Nov 30, 2020 - 10:43

Over 17 million voters on final voters' register - EC

The Electoral Commission (EC)) says a total of 17,027,641 eligible voters are on the final voters register for the 2020 Presidential and Parliamentary elections.

Chairperson of the EC, Jean Mensa, announced this on Monday, November 30, 2020, at the Let The Citizen Know press conference in Accra.

“I am pleased to inform you that the Final Voters Register has a total of seventeen million and twenty-seven thousand, six hundred and forty-one (17,027,641) registrants who are eligible to vote come December 7th, 2020,” she said as quoted by thedailyguidenetwork.

According to her, “Of the total number of registered voters, females constitute eight million, eight hundred and ten thousand, two hundred and eighty-three (8,810,283) representing 51.74% of the total Register while males amounted to eight million, two hundred and seventeen thousand, three hundred and fifty-eight (8,217,358), representing 48.26% of the total Register.”

She noted that Greater Accra has the highest number of registrants.

The region with the lowest number of registrants is North East Region, she said.

Addressing the issue of persons placed on the Multiples and Exceptions list, the EC boss said all political parties have duly been given the list to peruse ahead of the elections.

According to Jean Mensa "It was provided to them on the 7th of November 2020 together with the Voters Register,”.

“The total number of multiple registrations on the Multiples list today stands at fifteen thousand, eight hundred and sixty (15,860).” she added.

She clarified some concerns raised by critics in regards to 'the list' and how it was generated.

"It is instructive to note that the Multiples List is not generated by the Staff of the Commission. This list is generated by the ABIS system when it detects multiple registrations by a unique individual when the same set of fingerprints appears for persons bearing different names. The system picks this up and isolates the registrant. This is not done by staff of the commission.”

On the exceptions list she said ; "to date, we have a total number of 13,997 persons on the Exceptions list. It is important to note that the list was developed as a result of the citizens at the grass root level challenging and objecting to registration of certain persons. During the Registration Exercise a number of persons had their registrations challenged.”

“As a result, they were not provided with their Voter ID cards. Additionally, during the Exhibition period, a number of persons had their registrations objected to for some of the reasons stated above. It is important to know that those challenged at registration had to opportunity to appeal against the challenge to their registration by providing proof of their eligibility to be registered to the DRRC set up by the Electoral Commission to hear these cases. Some of the challenged persons had their challenges overturned and these persons were then provided with their cards and included in the Voters Register.”

She reiterated that the EC was not deliberately removing persons from the register and placing them on the Exceptions list.

Regional voter population Final

According to the EC boss;