University students in the country are considering the option of going to court to get the Electoral Commission (EC) to extend the just-ended limited registration exercise.
The exercise, which was intended to register Ghanaians who have turned 18 years and above or those whose names were not on the electoral roll but are eligible to register, ended last Sunday amidst concerns of possible disenfranchisement of potential voters, especially those in tertiary institutions.
Several university students – those from the University of Ghana (UG), Legon with over 40,000 students population, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), University of Cape Coast (UCC) and the University College of Education, Winneba (UCEW) – could not register during the exercise due to the fact that they had only one centre on their campuses which could not cater for the numbers there.
A call by the students and their leaders for the EC to extend the period of registration and set up more centres did not yield the expected results; as the EC could only set up one additional centre on the Legon campus with many still not registered.
This is what has compelled the University Students Association of Ghana (USAG) to be contemplating the option of going to court to seek redress.
Resolve
In an interview with DAILY GUIDE, USAG President, Henry Nkosuo Boakye, served notice that members of the association would not hesitate to go to court if the Commission and its boss, Charlotte Osei, fail to act on their concerns.
“We are not hoping that any student should be disenfranchised so our next line of action would be to go to the law court if the EC fails to heed our calls,” he told the paper whiles accusing the EC of negligence.
As a first step, he said USAG was officially petitioning the EC over their concerns for consideration but if persuasion failed they would consider the court action.
“Our petition will be at the Electoral Commission soon and we hope to hear from them within the shortest possible time or we take the second option,” he revealed.
Some people, including many of the affected students, have said the EC’s decision to set up only one centre at the various university campuses and sometimes none at all, was a deliberate attempt to disenfranchise them for fear of voting against the sitting government on Election Day.
According to Mr Nkosuo Boakye, “Planning was poor and the exercise was slow because students were not captured in their (EC’s) decision…because there were either no centres or only one registration centre existed at most of our universities.
“It has always been our firm belief that the Electoral Commission is there to serve Ghanaians; and university students are citizens of Ghana and we shouldn’t be disenfranchised.”
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