Angry Kasoa residents protest deletion of their names from voters register

Some angry residents of Down Town, a suburb of Kasoa in the Awutu Senya East Constituency in the Central Region on Wednesday besieged the office of the Electoral Commission (EC) in Awutu Breku to protest the deletion of their names from the voters register.

The angry residents say they got to the exhibition centre at Kae Mebre electoral area, to verify their names, only to be told by the EC officials that their names have been deleted from the register because they used NHIS cards to register during the 2012 registration exercise.

According to the residents, they were angry in the sense that none of them used NHIS card as proof of identify and argued that majority of them do not even possess NHIS card.

One of the angry residents told Oman FM that, “I don’t even have NHIS card so how can EC say that I registered with NHIS card? In fact I’m very angry.”

A 56 year-old Agyeman Badu, who also spoke to Oman FM in an angry tone, said he was going to invoke curses on whoever deleted his name from the voters register.

He rebutted EC’s claim that he registered with NHIS card saying “I don’t have NHIS card so it’s not true that I registered with NHIS card.”

“I want to vote this year so if somebody wants to disenfranchise me then I’m ready to go to my hometown in Akrofuom in Obuasi to consult the river deity there to invoke curses on that person,” he decaled.

Assembly Member for Kae Mebre Electoral Area, Hon. Jeffrey Mensah, who led the angry residents to EC’s office, told Oman FM that about 1,200 people in his electoral area alone had their names deleted from the voters register.

Hon. Jeffrey Mensah, who challenged the decision of the EC, noted that people he knew to have registered with NHIS card rather have their names still in the voters register.

He said they were not going to leave the EC office until their concerns have been addressed.

“We are appealing to the EC to register everyone of us since the exercise will end in about a week’s time,” he said.

Story By: Michael Creg Afful

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