Government has so far released over GHc 600 million to the Electoral Commission (EC), to aid it prepare for the general elections in November.
That’s according to the Employment and Labour Relations Minister, Haruna Iddrisu.
This figure is less than half the initial GHc 1.5 billion the EC in 2015, requested for the conduct of the elections. Mr. Iddrisu, also a member of Government’s Economic Management team, assured that government will honour any additional requests from the EC. Government initially slashed the GHc 1.5 to GHc 1.2 billion, a figure Ghana’s international donor partners expressed concern with, and then eventually allocated GHc 826 million to the EC.
Speaking at a Public Forum on the Constitution Amendment bill yesterday, Mr. Iddrisu revealed that, “so far, government has released GHc 693 million to support the operations and activities of the Electoral Commission out of a budget request of GHc 822 million.”
He added that, “as and when they [the EC] make additional requests, government will support and finance it.”
The Finance Ministry has also made budgetary provisions in the event of run-off during the elections, Mr. Iddrisu assured. “Ghana will honor its obligation to adequately finance and resource the EC to conduct a free and fair election, as and when they make additional requests, the Minister of Finance has made extra budgetary provisions in the event of a run-off,” he said.
Financial support from donors Aside the budgetary allocation from the government, the EC has also benefited from international donor support from the United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union.
The EC benefited from a 5 million Euro EU grant that was released to them and two other constitutional bodies, the National Media Commission (NMC) and the National Commission on Civic Education (NCCE). The United Kingdom Government also released £4 million as part of an electoral support programme for Ghana, which is to last for five years and will focus on sustainability.
The United States government has pledged financial support of over 4.5 million dollars for Ghana’s forthcoming elections.
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