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CUTS Ghana, a think tank on research and advocacy policies calls on the Electoral Commission (EC) to reconsider its decision to establish a new registry regardless of the National Identification Authority's database ( NIA).
Addressing a representative sample of the press, CUTS Ghana Country Director, Mr. Appiah Kusi Adomako, said: "Although the constitutional and statutory mandate of compiling electoral lists in the country is the prerogative EC exclusive, the Commission must be: reasonable and practical in light of what can be extracted from the NIA database.
… Although the work of the NIA is still ongoing, they should be completed by March 2020. The advantage of the Ghana Card is that it captures a lot of information, including digital addresses, which the EC and its IT department can extract from each piece of information. necessary and make an exhibition for people who want to change their polling station to do it.
"In 2012, the compilation of the biometric voter registration had cost the nation an amount of 148,942,378 GH ¢. Fast forward to 2020, given the increase in the number of voters and the 2012 cost adjustment to cedi inflation and depreciation, a conservative estimate could move the proposed registry to 2020 to 350 million cedis Ghana, "he added.
Given the huge investment and fun that surrounds the Ghana Card, there is concern about why the EC is rushing to use its own registry for the 2020 elections, before the completion of the Ghana Card . That same week, the NIA received sixty-two (62) vehicles, sixty (60) motorcycles and two (2) generators to facilitate the registration and issuance of national ID cards nationwide.
He added that in order to "ease the burden of transporting several agencies and departments to issue identity cards and create a functional database on national identity, the National Authority of Japan", said Identification (NIA) was created to give effect. In the past, there had been botched attempts to create the national database and issue identity cards, resulting in hundreds of millions of taxpayers' bleeding.
However, in September 2017, President Nana Addo launched the launch and issue of a national identity card commonly known as the "Ghana Map". The Ghana map project is expected to cost taxpayers about $ 1.2 billion in the long run. "
CUTS Ghana is worried about why a country with limited resources should not be perceived as dissipating taxpayer money into unnecessary projects. The estimated cost for the new voters list, if it is removed, can do a lot for a country bailed out after the IMF.
The money can be used to build 15 turnkey district hospitals with outpatient services, theaters, an auxiliary clinical unit, an accident and emergency unit, maternity, mortuary, stores and staff quarters, including 1,500 cogeneration compounds. In the field of education, it can build 1,250 blocks of clbadrooms of six units across the country.
It is instructive to note that the NIA has a technical committee consisting of a number of statutory public service institutions involved in the issuance of identity cards or interested in the management of data. These include the Social Security and Social Security Fund (SSNIT), the DVLA, the Electoral Commission, the Ghana Immigration Service (GIS), the Register of Births and Deaths, and many others. Again, why is the EC in a hurry?
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