A group of people claiming to be Ghanaians resident in Togo, are disputing claims by the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) that there are thousands of Togolese in Ghana’s voter register after comparing it with the Togolese electoral roll.
According to the group, which calls itself ‘Ghana Citizens in Togo,’ it is impossible for the NPP to obtain the Togolese voter register, which is the basis of their claims, since such a document isn’t even available to political parties in that West African country.
Addressing a press conference in the Togolese capital, Lome, on Friday, leader of the group, Joseph Brown Hammond, said a top official of the Togo Electoral Commission had denied giving that country’s voter register to any party in Togo, how much more a political party in another country.
He therefore, challenged the leader of the NPP team that conducted the investigation, to prove the source of the Togolese register used. He quizzed, “Where then did Dr. Bawumia get the Togolese voter register? We are therefore challenging Dr. Bawumia to present the register which he used in identifying the 75,193 potential matches.”
The NPP, about a month ago, made claims suggesting that Ghana’s electoral roll is bloated as such, there was the need for a new one.
According to the vice presidential candidate of the NPP, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, investigations showed that Togolese nationals were registered in Ghana and for that matter, a new register should be prepared before the December 2016 polls. He said there was proof that there were over 76,000 Togolese nationals registered in Ghana to vote.
To this end, the NPP has petitioned Ghana’s Electoral Commission (EC) to ensure that a new register is put in place.
Refuting this claim, the Ghanaians living in Togo quoted a document from the Ghanaian Mission in Togo which said, “According to Togo’s Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) headed by the Executive Secretary, Professor Kpatcha Takonda Kossi, it was impossible for anyone to lay his/her hand on Togo’s Voter’s Register since the document was a sovereign legal document kept firmly under guard.”
They claimed that Professor Kpatcha had also denied categorically that anyone from Ghana had obtained Togo’s voter register from the country’s INEC.
By Fred Duodu, Ho (freduoo@gmail.com)