Former Chair of the Electoral Commission, Charlotte Osei has said that she did not vote in last year’s elections.
She said she was at the beach on the 7th of December 2020 which was the voting day and also on 8th and 9th.
Asked why she didn’t monitor and vote during the polls, she said: “Why should I?
“I was at the beach [on the 7th, 8th, and 9th of December 2020], I didn’t vote, I didn’t monitor the elections, why should I? She said this to the media on Wednesday August 18.
When a journalist said he monitored the elections because he was paid by his media house to do so as part of his work, Madam Osei retorted “I wasn’t paid to monitor the elections. So can’t I have time with my children at the beach?”
Regarding electoral reforms undertaken by this current electoral commission, she said any changes or policies that seek to widen the space for inclusiveness should be accepted by all Ghanaians.
She added that policies that seek to make the people feel a sense of ownership of the Ghanaian institutions should also be embraced.
She said these when speaking to the media Wednesday August 18 on some of the electoral reforms proposals introduced by the current leadership of the elections management body.
The EC has made a number of reform proposals for elections in Ghana.
These include “We propose closing the polls at 3pm rather than 5pm. In 2019, we announced our decision to close the polls at 3pm rather than 5pm, in the 2020 Elections.
“Nonetheless, owing to the COVID-19 pandemic and the stringent, and necessarily time-consuming safety protocols we instituted at our polling stations, we were compelled to put this proposal on hold.
Over the past months, however, this proposal has re-surfaced from various sections of the public, and indeed, our own experience from the 2020 Elections has revealed that it is a workable proposal, as by 1pm, most polling stations were empty, suggesting that this is a workable proposal. Therefore, this is a reform we intend to put forward.
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