Liberia electoral officials observe biometric registration exercise in Ghana

Officials of the National Elections Commission of Liberia have observed the ongoing biometric registration exercise in the Akuapem North District as Liberia intends to go biometric.

The three-member delegation led by Mr Nathan P. Garbie, the Deputy Executive Director in- charge of External Affairs, told the Ghana News Agency in an interview that they were in the country to observe the biometric registration exercise because Liberia also wanted to adopt it in their next national elections.

He commended Ghana for taking ‘the bull by the horn’ to go biometric in this year’s Presidential and Parliamentary elections and added that all African countries were looking up to Ghana for a successful election in December.

Mr Garbie said having gone through five successful general elections without any political upheaval he believed that Ghanaians would exhibit another high sense of political maturity in December.

He said the time had come for all African countries to understand that democracy was the answer to much political unrest.

The Akuapem North District Director of the Electoral Commission, Mr Joseph Addo Boateng who took the delegation round some registration centres, said the exercise had been successful in the area except some few technical hitches at the initials stages.

He said the Akuapem North District recorded 52,252 voters during the first and second phases of the biometric registration exercise. The first phase recorded 30,644 and the second phase recorded 21,608 with 80 challenge forms were filled in both phases.

He said it had become necessary for voters to go through biometric registration because the old method of registration did not have built-in mechanism for detecting multiple registrations and voting.

Mr Boateng commended all the stakeholders for supporting his outfit to make the exercise success.

Source: GNA