Former President of Ghana, John Mahama has mentioned that Africa’s election system has seen a vast improvement with the passage of time. He made these remarks while addressing at Distinguished Speaker Seminar in Saïd Business School of Oxford University where administration invited as a special guest.
John Mahama further said that new innovation has been added in the election system like vote calculating in-situ, verification machines, biometric registers and a lot more. With the new improved system, the threat of disputes has decreased. However, the addition of information technology in result generation has triggered fears of hacking which can influence election results.
Mr. Mahama said that he remains involved in the promotion of democratic alliance in Africa after ending its term as president. This involvement has capable him to participate in conference related to the democratic and electoral system. He further added that our continent has moved forward from that era when steel boxes used for voting. The voters only have to cast their votes in the past. The remaining process from counting to declaring of votes occurred behind the scenes of the electorate.
The commencement of elections in Ghana, Kenya, and Sierra Leone are good examples of the modern electoral system. In 2016 Ghana elections, Electoral Commission (EC) declared final results after tallying the online results to centers results. Though, it caused a delay in announcement of results but they did so due to the chance of hacking in online results. We, as Ghanaians, should understand the whole procedure of elections for transparency before having another election in 2020.
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