Wa, Oct 17, GNA - The Upper West Regional Coordinating Council (UWRCC) on Thursday inaugurated a 12-member election security taskforce to oversee this year’s referendum and district level elections in December and the 2020 general polls.
The members include; regional commanders and officers of the Ghana Police Commander, Security Coordinator, Sector/battalion commander, Military Commander, Crime officer, Electoral Commission officer and divisional representative of Director-General of Defence intelligence.
The rest are; Ghana Prisons Commander, Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) Commander, Customs Division of GRA Commander, Fire officer and Immigration officer.
The RCC would also inaugurate similar taskforces in the 11 Municipal and District Assemblies.
The regional Police Commander chairs the committee at the Regional level, while Divisional/Municipal/District Police commanders chair it at the district level taskforce.
Addressing them at the inaugural ceremony in Wa, Dr Hafiz Bin-Salih, Upper West Regional Minister, said both the regional and district election taskforces would be supervised by a coordinating committee under the auspices of the national security Coordinator.
He charged the taskforce members to ensure overall security of the elections, secure safe transport and storage of ballot materials and ensure peace at polling stations on election day.
He also tasked them to see to the smooth settlement of complaints, ensure the arrest and prosecution of election offenders and identify trouble prone areas for advance planning.
“Make estimates on security personnel and expenditure required to police all polling stations,” he added, and any matters of security interests that would serve to successful elections.
“Let me also add that, an oversight Coordinating Committee under the auspices of the national security coordinator is to be put in place to support and advise the national election security taskforce to execute its mandate.”
Dr Bin-Salih enjoined members to be objective in the discharge of their duties in order to gain the trust and confidence of the people.
“You should not allow your political difference make you pitch tents against each other in the cause of performance of your duties,” he said.
Chairman of the Upper West Regional Election Taskforce and Regional Police Commander, DCOP Aboagye Narko, said the inauguration was to make the taskforce legally binding and urged the need to start work to ensure peace reigned before, during and after the elections.
He called on members to meet “periodically and intermittently” in order to run incident-free referendum and district level elections and have peace polls next year.
Upper West Regional Director of Electoral Commission, Mr Ali Osman, said the formation of the taskforce was in the right direction and would take care of the security situation in the elections.
“Elections are volatile and we must not underrate it, therefore having all the security men, I am sure this year’s district level and referendum election would be taken seriously so that we don’t have any security issues before, during and after the elections,” he added.
GNA
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