Dr. Vladimir Antwi-Danso is Dean of the Ghana Armed Forces Command and Staff College (GAFCSC)
• Dr. Antwi-Danso believes that the EC plays a central role in the country’s democracy and as such, it should be protected from the fallouts of political parties
• He is of the firm belief too that the EC has demonstrated itself to be up to the task, citing its impressive performance in the 2020 elections
• He has also called on the NDC to bury the hatchet with the EC and return to IPAC
The Dean of the Ghana Armed Forces Command and Staff College (GAFCSC), Dr. Vladimir Antwi-Danso, has said that the citizenry needs to protect the Electoral Commission from political parties.
He explained that the EC is central to Ghana’s democracy, hence the need to shield it from the actions of political parties that can affect its work and output.
“EC is the main prop of democracy and if we derail it, we will be in bad state. Political parties that have issues regarding their work must find a better and diplomatic way to communicate to the Commission and help it to improve on its work,” he said, reports gna.org.gh.
He said it is natural for political parties to engage in contestation but in doing so, care should be taken so that they do not compromise the EC’s work.
He made this known while addressing the media in Accra where he scored the Commission high marks in its performance in the 2020 presidential and parliamentary elections.
Dr. Vladimir Antwi-Danso also called for support from the populace for the EC.
“Within 38 days amid COVID-19, they successfully compiled voters register, bought new devices, employed effective technology in the process and voting was smooth,” he noted.
Also, he said that all the innovations by the EC were improvements over the 2016 elections, which, he explained, was saddled with more problems than the recent one of 2020.
“Yes, there are infractions in every election even that of United States of America, so was that of Ghana in 2020. We need to talk about it and share ideas on how to make our EC perfect. But to contradict the Commission at every turn is unacceptable,” he said.
He also maintained that it was wrong to lump the blame of the death of some seven persons during the elections, on the election organizing body, explaining that the Commission’s mandate is to conduct elections while the security services handle the mandate of ensuring that security in the country is paramount.
“The security officials have their mandate to help the EC if it so happened that the security agencies did not follow their standard procedure then EC cannot be blamed.
“We need to understand constitutionalism and institutionalism and their mandates. Do we understand the Electoral Commission? If we do then we will know when to help cause a change and when we are making mockery of them. Beyond that we are sowing the seed for chaos,” he stated.
In the meantime, Dr. Antwi-Danso wants the largest opposition party, the National Democratic Congress (NDC), to bury its differences with the Electoral Commission and return to the Inter-Party Advisory Committee (IPAC).
A few weeks ago, the NDC failed to show up at an EC-held IPAC meeting where it came up with some reforms for future elections, as well as reviewed the performance of the EC in the 2020 general election.