By: KALD|Voltaonlinegh.com|
President Akufo-Addo has joined the campaign for the upcoming national referendum seeking to introduce political parties participation in local government elections, with a call on electorates to turn out and vote massively for the motion.
The exercise, which will be conducted concurrently with the 2019 District Level Elections by the Electoral Commission, is scheduled for Tuesday, December 17, 2019.
With the colours representing the ‘YES’ and ‘NO’ votes on the referendum ballot already determined by the EC as ‘YELLOW’ and ‘BROWN’, President Akufo-addo has charged eligible voters to vote ‘Yellow’ on the D-day in order to ensure a positive outcome at the referendum.
Speaking at the 30th Anniversary celebration of the Akatsi South District Assembly on Monday as part of his 2-day working tour of the Volta Region, the president was of the view that, a successful amendment of the entrenched provisions under Article 55 (3) of the 1992 constitution to allow political parties involvement and sponsorship in district level elections, would deepen the decentralization process in the country.
According to him, “Already member of the district assembly are elected directly by the people but it is done in non-partisan way. But all we know the district assembly elections have ceased to be non-partisan long time ago and it is now time to strip to the veneer of non-partisan away and look at the reality, which is that they’re multiparty and partisan.”
“We want to bring democracy at the local level at step further and entrust to the people the right to select directly themselves the district chief executives as well as their assembly members and do so in an open, transparent multiparty basis.”
The president thus, called for the active involvement of all stakeholders to ensure that the constitutional threshold of at least 40 per cent voter turnout and 75 per cent approval at the referendum is attained to see through the amendment.
Source: www.voltaonlinegh.com
