The Western Regional Chapter of the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) has launched an election project dubbed; “The Western Region Manifesto Project” under the theme; “Harnessing Digital Journalism for Informed Political Dialogue and Manifesto Scrutiny”.

The project is being supported by grants from the Canada Funds for Local Initiatives (CFLI), and it is expected to run for over ten months.

The overarching objective of the project, according to the Regional Chairman of GJA-Western Region, Demond Cudjoe, is to amplify the voices of electorates on critical issues that matter to their development and communities.

Through this project, the GJA Western Region will facilitate the capacity and power of electorates in influencing political party manifestos while holding duty bearers, particularly elected parliamentarians and government to account.

Four major activities have been designed for this project;

1. A capacity building for journalists on election monitoring and reporting. This activity will build the capacity of over 40 journalists across the Western Region, and thus expose them to advanced election monitoring and reporting tools and techniques, fact-checking, security and safety mechanisms.
2. Serialized town hall meetings across 7 designated constituencies, where electorates could freely articulate their needs and expectations to political actors for consideration and secure their assurances of championing their course.
3. Political Parties’ Campaign Monitoring and election observation. This component of the project seeks to generate verifiable and factual publications and reports on political promises/pledges, and commitments to the expectations and needs of electorates in their respective constituencies. It will also assess and document public reactions to political manifestos.
4. Radio dialogues on topical issues uncovered pre-election, during and post-elections. This activity will enhance contributions from electorates in reshaping developmental agenda, and deepen the understanding of political actors on the developmental concerns of electorates.

With this project, the GJA Western Region will deploy a universal reporting platform and community discussion board to excite conversations on electoral and developmental issues peculiar to each constituency and the Western Region.

The project will engage various disciplines and actors including the parliamentary and presidential candidates, police, traditional authorities, the clergy, youth, women and other influential groups in the Western Region.

The GJA Western Region is hopeful this project will present any narrative about the Western Region, as it would empower electorates and residents to demand accountability from political leadership.