Former President John Dramani Mahama claims the deployment of military personnel to collation centres forced some electoral officers to declare results in favour of the governing New Patriotic Party during the 2020 general elections.
The former President says the 2020 election was not transparent, as touted by the Electoral Commission and government.
Speaking on Global FM in Ho during his “Thank You” tour to the Volta Region, the former president said although the 2020 elections were manipulated in the NPP’s favour, there is hope for the NDC to win the 2024 elections.
“But for a lot of scheming that took place, the NDC would have won the election. I do believe that we did win, but a lot of things went untoward and so even though power did not come into our hands, it does not mean we do not have the prospects of winning.
“We won the majority in Parliament, but you saw what happened on the day. Many of the polling centres injected soldiers and forced the electoral officers to pronounce results that were not real,” he claimed.
Although there were 61 recorded cases of electoral and post-electoral violence across the country, the Chairperson of the Electoral Commission (EC), Jean Mensa, has described the 2020 general election as historic, transparent, efficient, and cost-effective.
She has however urged the security agencies to make public the findings from the investigations conducted into the circumstances that led to the killing of seven persons during the 2020 general elections.
She pointed out the recommendations will make elections in subsequent years better.
“Sadly, seven lives were lost, and though these did not occur at our polling stations or arise as a result of misconduct on our part, one life lost is one too many. We are hoping that our security agencies will share their findings and recommendations for future learning”.
Credit: Citionline.com