Posts in category: Other News

The printing of the final biometric voters register for the December 7 polls will begin on Wednesday, November 4.

Ahead of that, the Electoral Commission (EC) will make soft copies of the register available to all registered political parties and any other persons that the EC considers necessary.

The Deputy Chairperson of the EC in charge of Operations, Mr. Samuel Tettey, told the Daily Graphic in Accra yesterday that although the calendar of activities slated the printing of the voters register for November 8, “we are set to start printing way ahead of this date.”

He said the printing and the distribution of the hard copies of the register to the regions would be done simultaneously, explaining that as “we finish the printing per region, we will distribute.”

Mr. Tettey said the EC cut down the printing of the provisional voters register from three weeks to seven days because it acquired two additional Xerox printers, adding that would help quicken the pace of printing the final register.

He gave an assurance that with the improved planning and execution of schedules, the hard copies of the final register should be available for the regions within 10 days from the start of printing, stressing that the parties would have the soft copies ahead of the printing on Wednesday.

Regulations

Per Section 27 (1) of Constitutional Instrument 91 (Public Elections – registration of voters – Regulations 2016: “The commission shall certify the register after the determination of claims or objections” by the District Registration Review Committee Officers (DRRCOs).”

Section 27 (3) provides: “After the register has been certified, it shall be published in the manner determined by the commission and shall replace any existing voters register.”

Section 27 (4) also provides: “The commission shall make available a copy of the register to the political parties and any other person that the commission considers necessary not later than 21 days after the register has been certified.”

Context

The EC conducted a 38-day voters registration exercise in clusters from June 30 to August 6, 2020.

It subsequently conducted a provisional voters registration exercise from September 18 to 25, this year.

The register paves the way for Ghanaians to cast their ballots on December 7 to elect a President and 275 Members of Parliament (MPs) to steer the affairs of the country from January 7, next year to January 6, 2024.

Certified register

Mr. Tettey explained that a certified register was one that had the master list of registered voters, after all corrections, inclusions and objection issues had been addressed.

Asked about what would happen to the names the Tamale High Court ordered should be included in the final register, he said the commission would abide by the ruling.

He explained that those names were part of the exception list, and that the EC only needed to restore them to the main register.

Mr. Tettey said the EC had 14,000 names on the exception list, while 16,000 names were on the multiple registration database.

The Deputy EC Chairperson explained that the exception list was for those whose registration had been disqualified by the DRRCOs, while the multiple registration list was for those individuals who registered more than once at different polling stations.

Those on the exception and the multiple registration lists, he said, would not be able to vote on Election Day because they did not object to their names being on those lists.

Special voting

To avoid the challenges associated with the 2016 special voting, Mr. Tettey said the list would be sent to institutions such as the security agencies, media organisations and election officials for them to know where they would vote on December 1, 2020.

He said the list would also be posted on the EC’s website for easy reference by those who submitted their names for the special voting.

In addition, he said, the EC had decided to print separate ballot papers for those who would vote on Special Voting Day.

In 2016, those doing special voting used ballots from the stock meant for the general election.

Source: Graphic.com.gh

The Special Prosecutor, Martin Amidu has raised issues with the controversial Agyapa Royalties Deal.

In his corruption risk assessment of the controversial deal, Mr. Amidu argued among other things that consultations over the agreement were not comprehensive and innovative enough.

He further disclosed that the selection and appointment of advisors for the agreement did not meet the “fundamentals of probity, transparency and accountability.”

The Special Prosecutor in his report took a swipe at the various officials who took part in the processes leading to the approval of the agreement.

According to him, the actors flouted several laws with impunity prior to the approval of the agreement.

“All the parties to the Mandate Agreement are deemed to have known the law but ignored it with impunity in signing and implementing the Mandate Agreement which is null and void ab initio as violating the Public Financial Management Act, 2016 (Act 921) and the Public Procurement Authority Procurement Act, 2003 (Act 663) as amended. This conduct which appears to have been in furtherance of the suspected bid-rigging, in the assessment of this Office severely lowered the risk of corruption, and rendered them a low risk enterprise in the Agyapa Royalties Transactions process and their approval. It is with these new lenses that the analysis of the risk of corruption, and anti-corruption assessments of the legality of the engagement of the other services providers and underwriters on the recommendations of the Transaction Advisors acting as the Ministry of Finance’s procurement entity tender committee contrary to Part VI of the Public Procurement Act, 2003 (Act 663) as amended, and Sections 7 and 25 of the Public Financial Management Act, 2016 (Act 921) afore-quoted were made.”

“It was further analyzed and assessed that the Transaction Advisor(s) nonetheless, went ahead to identify and recommend services providers and underwriters to the Ministry of Finance for appointment by the Republic of Ghana. The Ministry acted contrary to the Public Procurement Authority Act and the Public Financial Management Act in delegating the power to appoint services providers and/or other underwriters to the unlawfully appointed Transaction Advisor(s). The Transaction Advisor(s) whose selection and appointment by the Ministry of Finance did not measure up favourably to the analysis of the risk of corruption and anti-corruption assessment that meets the fundamentals of probity, transparency and accountability was/were potentially susceptible to undue influence, favouritism, cronyism, nepotism, and all forms of discrimination abhorred under the 1992 Constitution leading to the suspected packing of the services provider and underwriters position with entities not chosen on merit.”

Cephas Agbebianu Anani, a refrigerator repair apprentice and resident of Gbi-Kledjo in the Hohoe Municipality has been sentenced to five years imprisonment by a Ho High Court for soliciting for sex through internet blackmailing.

He was charged for defrauding by false pretence, extortion and publication of obscene material for cyber offences after pleading not guilty to the charges.

The convict was sentenced to five years each for defrauding and extortion and three years for the publication of obscene material, which run concurrently.

Chief Superintendent of Police, Mr Ayamga Akolgo, prosecuting told the Court presided over by Mr Justice Eric Baah, that between December 2018 and January 2019, the convict initiated an online conversation with the victim (name withheld), a teacher and resident in the same town through Facebook social media with user name ‘Gwada Thoni.’

He said the convict used a photograph of Prince Williams of the United Kingdom as his Display Picture (DP), pointing out that the use of a photograph of Prince Williams and the name Gwada Thoni was misrepresentation to deceive the victim under false pretence.

The Prosecution said through their Facebook conversation, the convict then asked the victim to upload her nude videos and pictures to him through his Facebook Messenger user account, which the victim complied.

Mr Ayamga said the convict after taking delivery of the nude materials from the victim, obtained her Whatsapp number through his Facebook account, and then informed the victim was a known person within his community.

He said the convict then threatened the victim to pay him an amount of GHC 2,000 else he would publish the nude materials and to prove that he was serious and capable of publishing the materials, he then re-sent the victim’s nude materials and that of someone identified as Edina back to the victim to fortify his position.

The Prosecution said the victim indicated to the convict that she did not have the money and pleaded with him not to carry out his threat.

Anani then gave her an option to have sex instead 10 times with victim, failure to comply would attract the publication of her nude materials on social media.

Mr Ayamga said the victim being worried and distraught, reluctantly agreed to have sex with the convict and bargained that she paid GHC 100 for him to rent a hotel, for which she obliged, leading to the convict renting a room at Afegame for the sex escapade.

The Prosecution said the victim then informed Hohoe Police, and they mounted surveillance at the hotel to arrest him, but outwitted the Police and was subsequently arrested in his hideout and charged.

Mr Justice Baah, sentencing the convict said though a first-time offender, he fraudulently and illegally set up traps for ladies on the internet to ambush them to expose their nudity adding the sentence was to deter others from engaging in similar acts.

He said the convict conducted himself as a professional businessman on the internet, using that to extort money and demanding sex.

Mr Justice Baah said the convict also indicated that he had prepared himself physically and spiritually well because of the dangers involved in the fraudulent acts.

He said the behaviour of convict violated the human rights of social media users and the laws of the country.

He condemned ladies for compromising their nudity on social media, imploring them to desist from such conducts.

The Minister of Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta insists that his outfit has been transparent with the processes that led to the approval of the controversial Agyapa Royalties Agreement in Parliament.

Ofori-Atta made the argument in a memo in response to a corruption risk assessment report released by the Special Prosecutor, Martin Amidu, on the Agyapa deal.

The report raised red flags against the deal and insisted that a number of processes were deliberately sidestepped.

But Ofori-Atta in the memo to the President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and sighted by citinewsroom.com insisted that the Attorney General and Parliament gave their blessing to the agreement because of the right processes the deal went through.

“Prior to initiating the Transaction, MoF ensured to undertake all the necessary prerequisite action required by law, from the procurement of transaction advisors, to the submission of transaction documents to the AG and Parliament for their review, input and approval.”

“This Ministry believes that it has been transparent from the onset. Once Government had independently assessed the potential value of the Transaction to Ghana, and Cabinet had approved the policy to monetize future gold royalties to support current developmental projects, MoF included in the 2018 Budget and Economic Policy Statement, Government’s intention to leverage the future wealth of Ghana’s gold resources to support current developmental needs,” Ofori-Atta said in the memo.

What the Special Prosecutor said in the report

The Special Prosecutor’s corruption risk assessment into the controversial Agyapa Royalties was made public on Monday, November 2, 2020, two weeks after it was submitted to the Office of the President.

In his risk assessment, Mr. Amidu among other things raised concerns with the entire deal and processes prior to its approval by Parliament.

“All the parties to the Mandate Agreement are deemed to have known the law but ignored it with impunity in signing and implementing the Mandate Agreement which is null and void ab initio as violating the Public Financial Management Act, 2016 (Act 921) and the Public Procurement Authority Procurement Act, 2003 (Act 663) as amended,” Amidu said in the report.

The Special Prosecutor also raised concerns with the appointment of transaction advisors for the deal.

He said laid down processes were disregarded by the Ministry.

“The absence of any evidence of the approval of the Mandate Agreement by Parliament under Article 181(5) of the Constitution makes the appointment of the Transaction Advisors also unconstitutional, null and void, and sins against any positive analysis of the risk of corruption, and anti-corruption assessment in their handling of the Transactions.”

Amidu also accused the Finance Ministry of awarding the transaction advisors deal to “surrogates” of the Ministry.

Finance Ministry rejects claims

Ofori-Atta, however, rejected the conclusions made by the Special Prosecutor over the Agyapa deal.

He insisted that “There is no justifiable reason for concluding that the current members of the MIIF Board will jeopardize their apparent professional integrity and reputations to engage in corrupt practices motivated by partisan considerations”.

Send Agyapa Agreement back to Parliament Nana Addo orders Finance Minister

Nonetheless, President Akufo-Addo has ordered the Finance Minister to send the agreement back to Parliament.

“The President has accordingly, instructed the Minister that, in the interest of transparency and accountability to the Ghanaian people, the Agreements supporting the transaction that were submitted to Parliament, and approved by the House, should be resubmitted to Parliament for the approval process to start all over again,” a statement from the Presidency directed.