Chairman of Ghana’s Electoral Commission (EC) has told the Supreme Court in the ongoing election petition that the serial numbers embossed on electoral record papers (pink sheets) are irrelevant, and therefore, bear no significance to declared election results. The petitioners had claimed in their pleadings that duplication of serial numbers on pink sheets was one of the vehicles used by the president and the governing National Democratic Congress in collusion with the Electoral Commission to rig the 2012 elections. However, Dr. Afari-Gyan, on Monday, June 3, 2013 told the court during his evidence-in-chief that the serial numbers on the pink sheets have “absolutely no relevance to the compilation and declaration of results”. He maintained that “the pink sheets are distributed randomly”.
According to him, the Electoral Commission identifies all polling stations “by their unique code and by their names”.
“…In fact throughout this trial so far, I’ve never heard anybody identify a polling station by a serial number”.
He clarified that even if two pink sheets had the same serial numbers in different polling stations, “that will in no way affect the validity of the votes cast”.
Explaining why duplicate serial numbers on pink sheets will not have any effect whatsoever on the validity of the votes cast, Dr. Afari-Gyan said: “1. Each of the two polling stations will have a different code and a different name; 2. there will be two different presiding officers and two different sets of officials; 3. There will be two different sets of candidates’ agents and there will be two different results entirely, so I see no problem”.
Full Article: Serial numbers irrelevant to election results – Afari-Gyan | General News 2013-06-03.
