The Institute for Democratic Governance (IDEG) as part of its efforts to ensure a transparent, free, and fair elections in the December 7th 2024 general elections, has trained over 50 volunteers to observe the election process in the Bono East region.
During the training, the observers were taking through series of training including the electoral rules and regulation, misinformation and disinformation, personal security and safety measures including many others.
The CEO of COPIO and Bono East regional Coordinator for IDEG’s observation, Mr. Mustapha M. Yeboah, in his welcoming address encouraged the observers to put in their best in ensuring a comprehensive and timely reportage to help safeguard the integrity of this year’s elections.
“Election observation is a critical component in safeguarding the integrity of our democratic process. Over the years, Ghana has managed the cyclical risks associated with our elections effectively, leading to a reduction in the number of large-scale international observer missions. For instance, the European Union has announced that it will deploy only a small team, complemented by local observers on election day.
“This new reality places a significant responsibility on local observer groups to ensure comprehensive coverage and timely reporting of the electoral process. In this regard, the strategic role of IDEG-CFI observers is indispensable.” He said
Mr. Mustapha Yeboah, also urged the observe to be neutral in their reportage since the credibility and peacefulness of the upcoming polls hinge on their reportage.
“Given the central role of observers in monitoring political activities, assessing security risks, and providing timely and accurate reports to the national Election Situation Rooms, your contributions are imperative to addressing the threats that could compromise the credibility and peacefulness of the 2024 elections.” He said
The Bono East Regional Deputy Police Commander, ACP David Amoako, enlighten the observers on personal security and how to communicate with the police especially on the day of elections.
According to him, although the Ghana Police is adequately prepared to ensure a peace elections, they will need the support of the populace especially the observers on the day of the elections to ensure peace and tranquility at the various polling stations since peace is a collative effort.
He further urged the observers to be mindful of their actions at their assigned polling station and be security conscious all time because the Techiman South and for that matter the Bono East region is one of the 7,251 flashpoints in the country.
Techiman South Municipal Electoral Officer of the Electoral Commission of Ghana, William Bamfo-Apori, on his part took the observers through the electoral process, election process, and what the Electoral Commission expect from them.
Addressing the media after the training, Mr. Innocent Adamadu, a member of the IDEG training team, says his outfit is committed in ensuring a transparent, free, fair, and peaceful elections in the upcoming polls hence the training of elections observers across the country.
He explained that, although IDEG will be working with some international bodies during the observation, they deem it fit to train more volunteers to assist them as the international bodies have indicated that they will not deploy many observers for this year’s elections.
“It’s an election year and IDEG is determine to train volunteers to observers the elections come December 7, so we have been training people across the regions.
“We will be working with international communities but they have indicate that they may not be able to deploy much observers this year so IDEG took it upon themselves to train more volunteers this time around to assist in the that direction.” He said.
Mr. Adamadu highlighted on some of the issues they trained their observers on.
“The training is about what observers are expected to be doing on that day, what they should do and what they should not do, how they should conduct themselves and learn some code of ethics with regards to the observation.
“We took them through several topics, we did this in collaboration with the EC and security institution, we engaged the police to come and tell us their preparation and how they are going to manage the election situation.
“We also had the EC who came in to throw more light into their activities on that day and what they expect from our observers.
“We took them through some key topics like how information works, disinformation and misinformation, how those things work in our reportage. We also train them on an app called Kobo collections which they will be using during the election day.”
He continued, “We will have an election situation room which will be manned by at least 3-5 people, the room will be equipped with gadgets that they will be using to communicate with the observers.
“Those in the regional situation rooms will communicate to our people in the national situation room, where will have a team of technical men who will analyze the information. Those information could help in engaging the public especially the media and other security institutions. “It is all to help in transparency to have free, and fair elections.”
He emphatically disclosed that, the observers will be deployed to their respective polling stations to observe the elections process and not to monitor the electoral officials or electoral process and therefore urged them to desist from engaging in any activity at the polling centers other than observation.
“So the observers will report to their assigned polling stations early in the morning even before 6:00am so that they can record how officials arrive and what they will be doing at the time of their arrival.
“They are not expected to engage themselves in any administrative work with the election officials, they are not expected to even question the happenings at the polling station should any situation occurs.
“It is not their duty to resolve disputes that may arise at the polling center, it is not their duty to help the officials that is the EC officials to arrange their documents or even help them to use their laptops.
“Their duty is to observe the process of the polls right from start to end so that they can report on what they have observed or a situation that has come up, so basically that is their duty, and we expect them to conduct themselves professionally jus as we have trained them.” He said
Source: Elvisanokyenews.com
