Accra, Dec. 6, GNA - The Coalition of Domestic Observers (CODEO), a civil society organization, on Saturday said it was deploying 4,000 independent observers to monitor Sunday's polls and would also verify the accuracy of the official presidential results. The Coalition would for the first time in Ghana use the Parallel Voting Tabulation, a recognized methodology for verifying election results, as used around the globe to promote greater electoral integrity.

In a pre-election press conference in Accra, less than 24 hours before voting starts on Sunday, the Coalition said over 1,000 observers, who were part of the 4,000 observers known as Rapid Response Observers (RROs), were being deployed to statistically representative, randomly sampled polling stations throughout the country. "These observers would report on key indicators such as the quality of the polls results, via text messages throughout Election Day," Prof Miranda Greenstreet, Co-Chair of the Coalition said.

Prof. Greenstreet said the over 4,000 observers would provide information to the CODEO Observation Centre at the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Centre at Teshie in Accra where CODEO would be issuing regular statements.

A system of reporting has been devised by CODEO officials to enable its observers to send their observation to the CODEO Observation Centre. The RROs would transmit five text messages at certain designated times during the Election Day.

"On the basis of these reports submitted by the RROs, and incident reports filed by the Regular Observers, Regional Coordinators and Constituency Supervisors, CODEO will be in a position to issue three statements within 24 hours of the elections," Prof. Greenstreet said. She said the coalition would issue a mid-day situation statement and a press release after the close of polls on Election Day, and a preliminary statement on the conduct of the elections in the afternoon of Monday, December 8.

Prof. Greenstreet said an eight-month pre-election observation conducted by CODEO, between April and November 2008, indicated that the overall electoral process had been transparent. The CODEO also commended the relative evenness of the political playing field, especially in terms of media coverage of the election campaigns and other political party activities. 6 Dec. 08