Ghanaians, at the time of writing this editorial yesterday, were still waiting for the presidential results of Monday’s general election, with unfortunate claims by former President John Mahama, the presidential candidate of the opposition NDC, that “Ghanaians have voted for a change.”
Though the EC had earlier promised to declare the winner within 24 hours, it had to extend the time to get all right.
Ghanaians had waited with bated breath for the results up to time during which both parties had to do ‘the usual gymnastics’ with the opposition National Democratic Congress starting the mischief, though by 08.00 hours in the morning, they knew by their monitoring of the processes that their flagbearer was behind civilization by over 500,000 votes.
Flip-flop lies
Worse still, there were some elements of the NDC leadership that were prepared to perpetrate the falsehoods into the night, despite the embarrassing truth that their darling former President John Mahama had broken the pot again, after breaking it in 2016 and taking Ghana to the precipice in 2012 in a dirty political game contrived with the then Electoral Commissioner to alter the destiny of Ghana.
Depending on a modest gain of some seats that had come their way, the NDC goons were prepared to latch on that piece of political fortune to claim overall victory. It was very unfortunate that Mr Mahama himself was one of such people.
Stealing mandate?
International opinion of the results of the presidential elections had the incumbent President firmly in charge, with former President John Mahama described as a no-match on account of his poor governance record as well as his low image as a President while in office – first as a mediocre development partner and also a criminal-minded individual cited in international fraud.
With Nana Akufo-Addo still expected to be in the driving seat, looking at the available figures, many felt it was needless for former President John Mahama to have claimed that Ghanaians had voted for a change, and that the NPP was trying to steal the people’s mandate.
That claim was certainly unbecoming of a former president since it had the potential to incite his supporters into violence, with the expected announcement of the real outcome which was obviously not going to be in his favour.
Well done
But all in all, it is the opinion of the Daily Statesman that all Ghanaians deserve some commendation for the way we conducted ourselves during the polls and its aftermath.
The Electoral Commission must be particularly lauded for defying all the odds to lead the nation to deliver that excellent electoral performance.
We have indeed cemented our position as the leading light of democracy on the African continent.
Indeed, it was our expectation that the declaration of the eventual winner of the presidential election would not offer any grounds for any miscreant to foment trouble, in the interest of the country’s peace, stability and development. And we were hopeful that the security agencies would deal with any eventuality.
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