Use Of Biometric Machines For Future Elections Will Be Waste Of Money
Non-governmental organization, Critical Thinkers International (CTI) has described as unnecessary waste of money and disadvantage for the Electoral Commission (EC) and Parliament to include Biometric Verification to the Constitutional Instrument (CI) 72.
According to the group, even though the purpose for the proposal, acceptance and inclusion of Biometric Verification in the last 2012 elections and beyond, it should be dropped entirely by the nation in all its future elections.
In a press release copied to Peacefmonline.com, Critical Thinkers International (CTI) has outlined a number of reason it believes the use of Biometric Verification in elections is waste of money.
Below Are Reasons Captured In The Press Release Of Critical Thinkers International:
A. On the issue of the Biometric Machines being unnecessary now, below are some of our reasons;
i. After the Supreme Court Judges(SCJ) ruled against the use of the Biometric Machine as a tool to prevent people who couldn't be verified by it from registering and/or voting when the issue surrounding it cropped up during the 2012 Election Petition, of which the Judges based their ruling on the Article 42 of the 1992 Constitution which says;
"Every citizen of Ghana of eighteen years of age or above and of sound mind has the right to vote and is entitled to be registered as a voter for the purposes of public elections and referenda", it currently means nothing including a Biometric Machine has the power to prevent anyone from voting as long as he/she is registered as an eligible voter.
ii. With the Electoral Commission(EC) currently pushing or have pushed for the inclusion into the current Constitutional Instrument(C.I.) 91 a rule which will allow people who cannot be verified with their fingerprints during elections to be allowed to vote through a verification with their pictures[Face Only(FO)], it has as a result rendered the use of Biometric Machines as a means of verification useless, and as a result defeated the actual purpose for which the machines have been intended for.
B. On the issue of the disadvantages CTI believe the Biometric Machines have brought to Ghana, below are some of them;
i. A lot of money was wasted by the country for the acquisition of the Biometric Machines for the elections(Registering and Voting) which at the end could not serve its purpose during the 2012 elections.
ii. Due to the allowance of some people to vote without Biometric verification at certain areas and others not allowed to vote at other areas for same reason, it is believed by CTI that it in a way affected the 2012 election results and as a result served as a disadvantage to some of the political parties.
iii. The biometric machines prolonged the voting period from one day to two days and a result brought a huge economic loss to the country and a majority of its citizens.
iv. It robbed some people of their right to vote.
The above therefore shows that the Biometric Machines have become both unnecessary and a disadvantage, and so in order to help prevent its future similar bad consequences and more to the nation, it should be dropped during all future elections.
Aside that, CTI will like to advise the EC and Parliament to in the future do a better analysis of proposals they are presented with before pushing or voting for its acceptance, so as to help avoid similar losses to the nation.
Thank you May God be praised always ..........SIGNED............ Critical Thinkers International [Creative Minds; Changing The World]
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