Students of second-cycle institutions in the Upper East region have vowed to boycott the upcoming general elections over their disappointment with the ongoing Limited Voters Registration exercise.

The declaration comes after they missed the opportunity to have their names on the roll of the Electoral Commission (EC) for failing to provide guarantors in the first phase of the exercise.

Key stakeholders including political parties are uneasy at the development and have made a joint plea for the disappointed students to take advantage of the second phase of the exercise. But the angry youth have turned down the proposal.

Boarding students in the Talensi District, after the first phase ended Monday without their names on the voters’ register, blamed the misfortune mainly on the EC’s strict demand for guarantors among other factors. A number of them, particularly those whose relatives reside far away from the communities where their schools are located, endured an exhausting, fruitless search for unfamiliar persons within and outside their campuses as guarantors.

Reports indicate that some students in the Builsa North District similarly became disenchanted after their hopes of voting for the first time this year were dashed for showing up at registration centres without guarantors. Quality FM, a private radio station in the Garu-Tempane District, observed that students eligible to register did not encounter trouble getting guarantors in the district but reported that political parties traded accusations of pushing minors to register in the area.

Unregistered students ignorant of requirements

A number of the disappointed students claim they did not know, until it was too late, that guarantors were to accompany prospective voters to registration centres.

“We didn’t know early that we should bring guarantors. They didn’t announce. They said we should go and bring guarantors. We went back, looking everywhere for people to guarantee for us. They refused. We went back to our school to see if our teachers could do that for us. They, too, said they were busy. We kept long there. By the time we came back here, they said the registration was over, that it was time for them to close,” Karim Farakan, a student of the Bolgatanga Senior High School (Big Boss), told Starr News at the Winkogo Primary A, a registration centre in the Talensi District.

Another student of the same school, Evelyn Adolewine, ranted: “We spent the whole day looking for people to guarantee for us. We even missed our meals, our lunch and supper. And we have exams to write. We are really angry. To make matters worse, we were not given much attention. Some people came to this centre, saying that students should give community members a chance to register. You have to go and look for your guarantors, two or five people. There are many students among us who don’t know anybody here.”

As the frustrated students walked away from the centre, where only 364 people were registered in the first phase, they chorused at the top of their voices: “We are annoyed. We are not voting!”

NDC, NPP disagree over students’ proposal

The students, before leaving the Winkogo Primary A Centre amid frustrations, called for centres to be established at second-cycle institutions for future registration exercises. Such arrangements, they believe, would see more first-time voters making headway with little or no strain in their bid to be registered.

But notable members of some political parties who were at the centre as of the time the students registered their protest greeted that proposal with mixed viewpoints.

“So far as the school is within an electoral area, they could create one there for them to get the opportunity to register," Volmeng David Nansong, the Talensi Constituency Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), said.

"Getting more teams and kit for registration in large electoral areas in future will help so that what we are experiencing will not be experienced again. They should try and split large electoral areas like this into three so that it would facilitate the work for everybody to get the opportunity to be registered,” he added.

The New Patriotic Party (NPP) parliamentary candidate for Talensi, Thomas Duanab Pearson Wuni, disagreed, saying only the tertiary institutions may be considered for such an arrangement.

“Universities, with over twenty thousand students, should have had centres. The secondary schools, no; because you don’t have too many of them," he asserted.

Then, he noted: "It’s disappointing for somebody, as young people, to want to vote for the first time but get frustrated. I think it’s not over yet. What we need to do is accept to allow them to move to the nearest place of registration and register. And when it’s time to transfer, they can transfer. We may have to persuade them. It’s a civic responsibility to vote."

Both parties saluted the EC’s firm demand for guarantor’s endorsement as a reliable measure to help check electoral fraud. But they asked that the registration period be extended beyond the original closing date, Sunday May 8, so more people could register.

EC welcomes campus polling stations

The fate of the unregistered youths in the region is dangling in the balance amid assurances from the Electoral Commission that calls for extension of the registration period would be put before higher authorities for consideration.

The Upper East Regional Director of the EC, James Arthur Yeboah, told Starr News concerns raised in the region with respect to the exercise would be relayed to the commission’s headquarters in a report on the first phase of the exercise.

“What we can do is to inform the head office that a situation like this happened. Whatever they would tell us to do about it, then, we do it. We don’t have instructions now on what to do in a situation like that. I will call Accra whilst we are doing our halfway reports. I will put it in my report. Whatever Accra will say, we will get it back to the public,” Mr. Yeboah assured.

The Electoral Commission also has hinted at the possibility of establishing polling stations in second-cycle and tertiary institutions following the petition from the unregistered students.

“The law says that we should register at a polling station. So, if the polling station is in their school, no problem. But I think this is an idea. I think we should establish polling stations in the secondary schools because the numbers are big. Instead of establishing a polling station close to the secondary schools, I think the secondary schools themselves should be polling stations.

“We should consider them as a community. It’s a suggestion I’m thinking now ahead of our next planning meeting. Maybe my future suggestion to the Commission is that when we are allocating polling stations, we should establish some right inside the secondary schools, polytechnics, et cetera,” the Regional Director intimated.

NCCE begs teachers to guarantee for stranded students

Meanwhile, the National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE) has expressed shock at claims by the unregistered students that the public was not told guarantors were required for the registration of new voters.

Speaking to Starr News, the Deputy Upper East Regional Director of the commission, Joseph Kweku Yeboah, rubbished the claims as pure attempts on the part of the students to deny responsibility for their own faults.

"We have always announced that they should look for guarantors. If they claim they didn't hear, then, they should go home and look for their parents to come and guarantee for them. You need two people to guarantee for you and those two people cannot guarantee for more than five people. Five students can look for two people to guarantee for them. It's that simple. This announcement has been everywhere before the exercise started. That is the not-me syndrome. Some people just like blaming others for their own faults, and that has been the bane of Ghana's development," the Deputy Director remarked.

Whilst making it known that limited resources, especially inadequate fuel, have remained a major challenge as the commission seeks to intensify public education and monitoring of the exercise, Mr. Yeboah also entreated school authorities to offer themselves as guarantors for stranded boarding students.

“We plead with teachers, heads of institutions, that they should assist the students and guarantee for them. It’s an educational institution. Their parents are not there. They cannot go home and bring their parents to come and guarantee for them. They should assist them to register,” he entreated.