By Emmanuel Gamson
Takoradi, Aug. 29, GNA – The National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE) has urged politicians seeking power to use monies for ‘vote buying’ to undertake development interventions to benefit the citizenry.
Mr Yusif Usman, the Effia-Kwesimintsim Municipal NCCE Principal Civic Education Officer, said the issue of voter inducement in the country’s political landscape bred corruption and subsequently hindered the socio-economic development of the country.
He was speaking to the Ghana News Agency on the sidelines of the inauguration of an Inter-Party Dialogue Committee (IPDC) for Effia and Kwesimintsim constituencies in the Western Region.
He said the political parties’ code of conduct prohibited political actors from inducing the electorate with money to vote for them.
Mr Usman said: “The buying of votes is now prevalence based on some interactions we have had with some electorate, and I believe that this issue really threatens our democracy as a country.”
“Instead of spending these huge sums of money on influencing people to vote for you, politicians should rather channel those monies into developing our country, because at the end of the day, that is why are electing them to leadership positions in the first place,” he added.
Touching on the IPDC, he said the Committee was to focus on potential threats such as vote buying, religious and ethnic intolerance, and misinformation/disinformation that might result in violence and subsequently affect the peaceful conduct of the December general election.
In addition to the Committee’s dialogue function, he stated that the IPDC would help monitor and resolve cases of breach of rules and regulations governing the conduct of the elections.
Mr Usman encouraged the committee members to execute their assigned tasks diligently to help preserve the peace and stability in the country.
GNA