Elections on African Soil

ELECTIONS ON AFRICAN SOIL

Elections in Africa has often been characterized by issues .This issues stem from the fact that either the one who is alleged to have lost the election is not willing to accept the results of the election. Another issue also when a particular leader is in power for the said constitutionally mandated term and is expressing interest or has expressed interest in running for another term again .Such decisions leads to conflict since factions may not agree with such decisions bringing pain and strive which leave mothers and their children more vulnerable.A trip down memory lane to stress the point am making recently in Burundi president Pierre Nkurunziza is going for another term of office and a section of the people do not agree with him which is causing Burundi a lot. .Another trend that also started among some African leaders is the power sharing which in Kenya happened between MwaiKibaki and RailaOdinga and in Zimbabwe between Robert Mugabe and Morgan Tsvangirai .This deals obviously did not go down without misunderstandings ,fights ,accusation and counter accusation before such deals were agreed on .this often makes the organization of elections in African countries likened to the country walking on thin ice just because of the fear of how it might end up .

Let me now zoom in on my beloved country Ghana . Ghana like other African countries as well has various tribes ,religious groups and has also had issues with regards to elections as well .with our election 2016 about to happen on November has all media waves buzzing especially on interviews with regards to election and also our voters register because there are claims of people below the age of 18 registering and also foreign nationals registering .this issues generated a lot of controversy with some factions saying the register should totally be changed others say it should be “cleaned “that is delete the names of those who are below 18 and foreign nationals from the register until this issue is somehow been solved . Another issue that Ghana is facing with regards to election is tribal issues as I said earlier Ghana like other African countries has many tribes and when it comes to elections often the tribal sentiments come into play this is because the political parties tend to have strong support base from especially their tribes they belong to .and even currently there are accusations and counter accusations over which political party tends to make comments that incite tribal politics and I am happy because when such issues come up bold ones tend to name and shame the politicians that go that direction .the electoral commission of Ghana like any other organization also has its issues especially with the voters register as I said earlier and also their rebranding exercise has not been left out as well with the new logo also generating lots of issues which also stem from the fact that they are rebranding the exact year we Ghanaians are going to the polls . will they be able to focus more and deliver credible polls for Ghanaians ? I hope so.

With all this issues I hope the electoral commission of Ghana will pull through to organize peaceful and credible election for Ghana to be a shining example once again.

Stella Annan