Regional News of Tuesday, 18 May 2004

Source: GNA

Good turnout on first day at Ho photo taking exercise

Ho, May 18, GNA - There was a good turn out in the Ho township when the photo taking exercise to complete the replacement of the Voters Roll began Tuesday morning.

The initial anxiety that characterised the exercise, which saw people trouping to form queues died down by mid-morning. There was orderly movement of people in queues at all the centres visited by the Ghana News Agency (GNA).

At the Global Evangelical Church Centre at Ho /Fiave, 102 out of an electoral roll of 1,124 people had taken their photos by 1045 hours when the GNA got there.

Mr Raphael Nyaho, a Registration Officer, said registration officials found it difficult to control the enthusiastic crowd when the centre opened, but when they realised that the procedure could be fluid, they maintained their composure for things to go orderly.

By 1030 hours, 42 had taken their photos at Anlo-Kordzi Asiviame centre which had 850 registered voters on its roll, 64 out 550 at Doris Day Memorial Centre, 90 out of 450 at the Pentecost-Bankoe, 60 out of 800 at the Deeper Life Centre-Bankoe and 60 out of 650 at the OLA Secondary School Centre.

Apart from Mr Elinam Gavor, Registration Officer at the Deeper Life Centre, who told the GNA that he was handling one case of a voter whose name could not be traced, all the centres reported smooth and incident free exercise.

The presence of Political Party agents was not evident at the centres visited, except for OLA Centre where Mr Christian Letsa, the Registration Officer told the GNA that only the National Democratic Congress (NDC) was present. The six-day exercise ends on May 23.