Power to appoint EC Chair should be taken away from the President – Prof Agyeman-Duah

A Governance Expert, Professor Baffour Agyeman-Duah has suggested that the powers given to the president to appoint a chair of the Electoral Commission (EC) should be taken away and given to another body outside of the executive arm of government.

This, he said will inspire confidence in the electoral process.

Prof Agyeman-Duah said this while sharing his view that the way and manner in which the Former Chair of the Electoral Commission Charlotte Osei was removed from office was strange.

He stated that the fact that one petition against her was acted upon by the president in referring it to the Chief Justice for steps to be taken was problematic.

To him, a single petition against the Chair of the Commission was not enough to warrant the removal.

Speaking in relation to the concerns raised by the National Democratic Congress (NDC) against the current voter register, on TV3’s Big Issue, Monday, September 9, Prof Baffour Agyeman-Duah suggested that there should be better ways of handling such petitions against the EC chair.

“The way the former Chair Charlotte Osei was removed was strange, just one individual submitted a petition, and that one individual’s petition was conveyed to the Supreme Court. This gives room for others to come and do the same. I think there must be a better way of handling a petition to remove the EC chair,” he said.

“Selecting the EC Chair independently of the executive will go a long to help. The appointing authority is an issue here, the president appoints but in many countries, the EC chairs are appointed outside the executive authority.”

Mrs. Osei and two of her deputies, Amadu Sulley and Georgina Opoku Amankwa, were on Thursday, June 28 removed from office as Commissioners of the Electoral Commission (EC) by Nana Akufo-Addo on grounds of “stated misbehaviour and incompetence”.

Their removal was on the back of recommendations from a committee set up by the Chief Justice to investigate the three on allegations brought against them by some staff of the Commission in July 2017.

Some Ghanaians and some members of the National Democratic Congress have accused the Akufo-Addo-led government hiding behind a petition to remove especially Mrs Osei who was appointed by John Mahama three years ago. They grounded their claim on some utterances by key members of the New Patriotic government prior to their coming into office to the effect that they were going to ensure the removal of Mrs. Osei.

But President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo justified the removal of Mrs. Charlotte Osei and her two deputies from office, indicating that though the decision was a painful one, he had no choice but to act the manner he did.

 

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