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Dec 7 polls: You can’t declare results, winners – EC warns political parties
The Electoral Commission (EC) has warned the political parties that they do not have the right to declare results and winners of the December 7 elections.
The Director of Electoral Services at the elections management body, Dr Serebour Quaicoe said that it is only the Commission that has the power to do so.
He explained that the parties and the media can only project the results they have collated but not to declare a winner.
“No political party can declare results. They can project their results. The media can tell us that genuinely they have gotten all the polling station results. So they can project who is winning a constituency,” Dr Serebuor told TV3 in an interview on Tuesday December 1.
He further expressed optimism that the commission will be able to declare the results of this year’s elections in less than 24 hours after polls had closed at 5 PM on December 7.
The EC had resolved to release the results as early as possible.
He explained that the EC has put in place measures to ensure that the results are announced in record time.
He said ”we all know that on the day of the election, two hours after elections the polling stations get their results. You the media people will be announcing the results. So what stops as from fast tracking the movement of the results?
“Within 24 hours after the poll the result can move from polling station to constituency to regional and then to national. If everybody commits, themselves to it, it is doable.”
He further dispelled claims that potential technical and technological hitches could derail the plan to release the results in real time.
”We will not use technology to declare else I will say within 5 hours we can get the results. Any party can organise themselves very well, equip their agents and get projections. Their polling agents can snap the results. We can’t use that,” he said.
By Laud Nartey|3news.com|Ghana
The post Dec 7 polls: You can’t declare results, winners – EC warns political parties appeared first on 3NEWS.
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