ghananlpcommunity/ghana-gov-speeches-sentences huggingface dataset:
We certainly could not have come to this point without Him.
I say this because we have prevailed and conducted a successful Voters Registration Exercise against all odds.
As a Commission we have not lost sight of the circumstances around which the 2020 Voters Registration Exercise was conducted.
Here, I’m referring to the COVID-19 pandemic and its effects on our operations and activities.
As you may all be aware, we were confronted with a myriad of obstacles prior to the commencement of the 2020 Voters Registration Exercise.
The Covid-19 pandemic threatened to throw our activities out of gear.
First of all, it affected the global supply chain worldwide and caused the manufacturing industry which came to a grinding halt.
This meant that the major manufacturing companies worldwide had to shut down.
The manufacturers of our devices i.e.
the Biometric Voter Registration Kits (BVRs) and Biometric Verification Devices (BVDs) also closed shop for a period of time creating a lot of uncertainty around the production and delivery of the kits.
Additionally, as a nation we were all confronted with fear and uncertainty around the Corona virus not knowing what lay ahead.
We also had the global and national lockdown which brought the world and our nation to a standstill.
Yet in spite of the circumstances and uncertainties we kept our focus and remained unperturbed, cognisant of the fact that this too would pass.
Faced with the uncertainty around Covid-19 pandemic and the lockdown,we had no option then but to revise our calendar and move all our activities from April to July, three (3) months behind our planned schedule.
It meant that, for the first time in the history of the country, a new register was to be prepared in July, as opposed to previous new registers which have been conducted in the first quarter of the year.
The revision of the calendar meant that the register had to be compiled in the rainy season.There was the fear that our registration activities would be hindered by the rain.
There were also real threats that the fear of the virus would result in a low turnout at the Registration Centres and ultimately lead to voter apathy.It was widely speculated that the Commission would not achieve its target of 15 million.
However, to the Glory of God we have exceeded the set target of 15 million and recorded a total number of 16 million 963 thousand 306 registrants (16,963,306 million registrants).
We experienced a six (6) week period of no rain in a rainy season.
In spite of the Covid-19 fears and threats, the turnout by Applicants at all Registration Centres throughout the country was massive, leading to the high number of registrants at all Registration Centres nationwide.
The Aged, the vulnerable, persons with disabilities and the youth all participated extensively in the Exercise.
Additionally, the kits arrived just in time and worked efficiently.
Thankfully, the COVID-19 protocols put in place ensured that lives were not endangered.
By Gods grace, we did not witness the deaths of citizens as predicted.
For all of this and many more, we are grateful to God.
We say with conviction that if it had not been for the Lord on our side, we could not have come to this point.
Distinguished Ladies and Gentlemen, my presentation today will focus on ten (10) key areas namely; Overview of the registration process Number of persons with disability who participated in the voters registration exercise The gender dynamics First time voters Type and statistics of documents presented by the applicants at the registration centers Number of applicants who registered without fingerprints Challenge cases Total number of registered voters at the end of day 36 Number of registered voters at the end of the 2 day mop-up exercise by region Final provisional figures for the 2020 voters registration exercise Overview of the registration process The main Registration Exercise and the Mop-Up ended successfully on Sunday the 9 th of August, 2020.
From the very onset, the Commission was determined to ensure that no eligible voter was left out of the process.
We are pleased to say that the Exercise was inclusive,participatory, orderly and peaceful.
Ghanaians came out in their numbers to register and we commend you all for your interest and participation which made the Exercise a success.
Theexperiences and accounts shared byour stakeholders indicate that the training afforded to all our temporary staff was effective.
The efficiency and professionalism of our field staff coupled with the robustness of the registration kits contributed to the high number of registrants witnessed today.
On average, we recorded 150 registrants per kit per day as compared to previous registrations where we averaged some 80 persons per kit per day.
In some places, field staff recorded up to 280 persons per kit per day.
This accounts for our ability to exceed our target of 15 million registrants well before the end of the exercise.
It is important to note that by day 31 of the exercise we had recorded about 15 million 178 thousand 107 Applicants (15,178,107 Applicants).
Number of persons with disability who participated in the voters registration exercise We are gratified to note that a significant number of persons with disabilities participated in this Exercise.
As part of our commitment to ensure that no one was left behind, the Commission made arrangements to cater for a section of our societyat all District Offices of the Electoral Commission throughout the country.
This is the first time such an arrangement has been put in place.
As a Commission, we wanted to ensure that vulnerable groups, the aged, persons with disability, pregnant women etc all felt comfortable to participate in the Registration Exercise.
It paid off.
At the end of the Registration Exercise, 64 thousand 996 persons(64,966) with disability had successfully registered in the process.
This represents 0.56% of the total number of persons registered and demonstrates good progress.
The gender dynamics We now come to the important subject of Gender.
At the end of the Registration Exercise, our statistics show that 8 million 775 thousand 609 (8,775,609) women registered,compared to 8 million 187 thousand 698 men (8,187,698).
Women make up 51.73% of the register whilst men make up 48.27%.
The Upper East Region recorded the highest number of female registrants per population with 54.6%.
The Western Region had the highest number of male registrants per population with 51.2%.
Fist time voters Now to the issue of the First Time Voters.
For the purposes of this presentation, we classify First Time Voters as persons 18 years of age at the time of their Registration.
As mentioned in our previous presentation, we classify this age group as First Time Voters because over the last two years, the Commission has conducted two (2) Elections;a District Level Election in 2019 and a Referendum in 2018.
Therefore, there is the possibility those above the age of 18 may have voted in those Elections.
At the end of the Exercise, 762 thousand 944, (762,944) 18-year olds had registered as voters.
This figure represents 4.5% of the total register.
To go a little deeper, 612 thousand 104, (612,104) 19 years olds also registered as voters.
In a nutshell, the total number of 18- and 19-year olds who had registered at the end of the Exercise amount to 1 million 375 thousand 048 persons (1,375,048).This figure represents 8.1% of the total register.
Type and statistics of documents by applicants at the registration centers Out of the over 16 million persons who registered at the end of the Exercise, 60.09%of Citizens used the Ghana card.
37.99% registered through the Guarantor System and 1.92% registered with their passports.
The region with the highest number of persons who used the Ghana card is the OtiRegion where 79.1% of the registered population presented the Ghana card.
They are followed by the Eastern Region where 78.5% of Applicants presented the Ghana card.
The Western North Region came third with 76.9% of the registered population presentingGhana cards.
Regarding the use of the Guarantors, the Bono EastRegion recorded the highest use of the Guarantor systemwith 58.5% registering with guarantors.
They are followed by the Bono Region and Ahafo Region.In both regions, 57.7% of theregistered population used the Guarantor system.
Number of applicants who registered without fingerprints A number of Applicants who presented themselves for registration had lost their fingerprints.
This made it impossible for the scanners to capture their fingerprints.
This was however not unexpected, and these Applicants will be verified on Election dayusing our Facial Recognition system.
At the end of the Registration Exercise, the number of persons who were registered without fingerprints amounted to 61,995.
This represents0.37% of the total number of persons registered.
The Upper East Region hadthe highest number of this class of Applicants.
A total of 9,244 applicants were found to have traumatic fingers.
The region with the lowest number of trauma cases was the Ahafo Region, which had only 813 persons withtraumatic fingers.
It is important to explain, that the nature of one’s occupation often accounts for this phenomenon.
Challenge cases One of the mechanisms set out in the law for cleaning the register and ridding it of ineligible persons is the Challenge system.
The Challenge system, contributes to ensuring and guaranteeing the credibility of the Register.
It allows a qualified registered voter to challenge the registration of an Applicant on the grounds that the Applicant does not satisfy the laid down criteria namely; that the Applicant is not Ghanaian, he/she is not 18 years old and that the Applicant is not of sound mind.
At the end of the Exercise, the number of Challenge cases amounted to 37 thousand 762 cases (37,762).
This represents 0.20% of the total register.
The regional breakdown will be available online.
From the data, one can observe that the Oti Region had the highest number of Challenge cases per population with 0.51% of registrations being challenged.
This is followed by the Ahafo Region where 0.38% of registrations were challenged, and then the Volta Region with 0.37% of registrations were challenged.
It is evident that most of the Challenge cases are from border regions with the exception of Ahafo.
It gives reason to assume that the Challenges relate to citizenship issues emanating from the infiltration offoreigners.
At a later date we will shed more light on our findings.
The Commission is mindful of the infiltration of foreigners at a number of our Registration Centres.
Additionally, we are aware that a number of minors have also found their way into the register.
We are confident that the Challenge processes initiated at all Districtsthroughout the country will unearth these illegal persons and rid the register of those who do not qualify to be on the register.
We are confident that the register that will be used for the 2020 Elections will be a wholly Ghanaian enterprise reflecting qualified Ghanaians and Ghanaians only.
Total number of voters at the end of day 36 Finally, we come to the issue of the number of persons who have registered to date.At the end ofthe 36-dayExercise 16 million 932 thousand 492 (16,932,492) persons had registered as voters.
Number of registered voters at the end of the 2 day mop-up exercise by region At the end of the Mop-up Exercise,30 thousand 814 persons successfully registered as part of the 2020 Voters Registration Exercise.
The total number of registered voters at the end of the Exercise stands at 16 million 963 thousand 306 (16,963,306).
The Regional breakdown is as follows: REGIONS TOTAL REGISTERED GREATER ACCRA 3 million 509 thousand 805 ASHANTI 3 million 13 thousand856 EASTERN 1 million628 thousand180 CENTRAL 1 million566 thousand061 WESTERN 1 million185 thousand315 NORTHERN 1 million47 thousand539 VOLTA 929 thousand 322 UPPER EAST 653 thousand730 BONO 648 thousand408 BONO EAST 592 thousand015 UPPER WEST 470 thousand271 WESTERN NORTH 465 thousand444 OTI 353 thousand492 AHAFO 315 thousand827 SAVANNAH 295 thousand648 NORTH EAST 288 thousand393 TOTAL REGISTERED 16 million 963 thousand306 As explained at all our “Let the Citizen Know” encounters, these are provisional figures.
The process of Deduplication which is ongoing will flag multiple registrations in the system.
Additionally, the Challenge system put in place during the Registration and Exhibition Exercise will further flag unqualified voters on the register.
Ultimately, these processes will contribute to the cleaning of the register and ensure its credibility ahead of the 2020 Elections.
Ladies and Gentlemen, we have come to the end of today’s “Let the Citizen Know” encounter.
Before we take a bow, we would like to assure the good people of Ghana that as a Commission we are determined to put in place and ignite all the mechanisms available to us to clean the register and to rid it of all unqualified persons i.e.
minors and foreign nationals.
We are confident that at the end of the day we will present Ghanaians with a credible register that reflects Ghanaians and Ghanaians alone.
A wholly ownedGhanaian enterprise.
We would like to express our sincere gratitude to the citizens of Ghana for believing in us and for participating massively in the 2020 Voters Registration Exercise.
The spirit of patriotism demonstrated over the past six (6) weeks has been phenomenal.
We are most grateful to you.
We would like to thank all our partners; the Security Agencies under the auspices of the Election Security Task Force, the Media and the Civil Society and Observer groups for this contribution which made the 2020 Voters Registration Exercise a success.
We would also like to thank all our staff- our indefatigable Regional Directors, Directors, Deputy Directors, District Electoral Officers and support Staff as well as our Temporary Officials for their hard work and efforts to make the 2020 Voters Registration Exercise a success.
We cannot end without thanking the Almighty God for seeing us through a successful Voters Registration Exercise.
His faithfulness is constant.
That we have had 36 days of no rain in a rainy season and a smooth and seamless Voters Registration Exercise it can only be by His grace.
We are grateful to God.
God bless our Homeland Ghana and make our Nation great and strong.
THE CHAIRMAN OF THE SYMPOSIUM, Mr.
Saul Froomkin, KC THE CO-CHAIRMAN OF THE SYMPOSIUM AND PROFESSOR AT THE CENTRE OF DEVELOPMENT STUDIES, UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE, Prof.
Barry Rider MY LORDS, HER MAJESTY’S ATTORNEY-GENERAL FOR ENGLAND AND WALES, HONOURABLE ATTORNEYS-GENERAL FROM VARIOUS COUNTRIES REPRESENTED HERE, HONOURABLE MEMBERS OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS THE RT.
LORD MAYOR OF THE CITY OF CAMBRIDGE, THE RT.
LORD MAYOR OF THE CITY OF LONDON, SENIOR MEMBERS OF THE JUDICIARY Gathered here, HEADS OF LAW ENFORCEMENT INSTITUTIONS AROUND THE WORLD gathered here, THE DEPUTY ATTORNEY-GENERAL & DEPUTY MINISTER OF JUSTICE of the Republic of Ghana, Good morning everyone.
I bring you greetings from the President and the people of the Republic of Ghana.
I feel honoured to be invited to deliver a Keynote Address at the 40 th Cambridge Symposium on Economic Crime.
This is my third appearance at this forum, and my second as Attorney-General and Minister for Justice of the Republic of Ghana.
My sincere gratitude, and congratulations as well, go to the Chairman and Co-Chairman of this Symposium, Saul Froomkin KC and Prof Barry Rider, as this week will see a consolidation of the noble activity they have been engaged in the past 40 years.
Year after year, this forum literally brings under one roof those at the helm of the prevention and reduction of abuse to the financial system worldwide, and whose voices and actions matter globally, in the establishment of values that protect the global financial system from the consequences of economic crime and misconduct.
From Attorneys-General around the world to senior legislators, judicial officers, diplomats, leading academics in law and business and police chiefs in over 100 countries, participants have regularly analysed and examined the constantly evolving threats facing the global financial system as a result of criminal and other nefarious activity.
In all of this, distinctly, the Cambridge International Symposium on Economic Crime is far from being a mere talk shop.
Its enviable track record for being a global platform that delivers practical solutions to economically motivated crime and misconduct worldwide is truly established.
We must applaud Prof Barry Rider and Saul Froomkin KC for the consistency in the organisation of this symposium.
The theme for this year’s symposium – Integrity – could not have been more appropriate.
Integrity is the one word which runs through the grain of everything we do as persons concerned with enriching any system we work with.
In the words of former US Senator, Alan K. Simpson , “ If you have integrity, nothing else matters.
Classically, this sums up the importance and indispensability of integrity in every situation including the creation of a world economic order insulated from the nefarious activities of criminal and unethical behaviour.
Whilst noting that the use of the word “integrity” may be more common in professional and personal contexts, the intricate relationship between integrity and economic practices cannot be lost.
The creation of a clean, transparent and accountable financial environment is dependent on structures and systems anchored in integrity.
The deployment of sophisticated schemes to circumvent procedures and facilitate the commission of crime and other kinds of improper conduct in the global financial space, brings into sharp focus questions of ethics and integrity.
The manifestations of economic crime are increasingly getting complex because of various actions by professional enablers whose conduct borders on unethical behaviour.
These are breaches of procedures, violation of laws, laundering, creation of shell companies, opaque financial systems and concealment of illicit wealth.
Chairman, the intricacy and multidimensional nature of economic crime undoubtedly enjoin us to have a network of gatekeepers such as lawyers, bankers, real estate agents, insurance service providers and luxury service providers who are bound up by strong rules of ethics and accountability.
A free, progressive and equitable society requires a world with men and women of integrity.
GHANA’S EFFORT IN PROMOTING INTEGRITY IN THE ECONOMIC SECTOR Ghana has had and continues to have its fair share of threats to its financial and economic sector.
In my role as Attorney-General and Minister for Justice of the Republic, I have come to understand that any serious endeavour to fight economic crimes must be firmly rooted in the establishment of systems for its deterrence, undertaking of smooth investigations where same occur and a sound vehicle for prosecution and punishment in a fair and efficient manner.
These systems have a close connection with the peculiarities of the Ghanaian society.In Ghana, public procurement plays a preeminent role in the development of the nation.
At the same time, public sector corruption evokes strong emotions.
In view of this, the nation has enacted a set of rules, from the Constitution of the country to specific laws in the financial sector founded on the principles o f integrity, to regulate procurement in the public sector and to curb abuse and insider trading.
Thus, public servants are forbidden by article 284 of the Constitution from placing themselves in situations where their personal interests interfere with or are likely to interfere with the discharge of their duties.
One piece of legislation that is directly intended to prevent economically motivated crimes and the abuse of office is the PROCUREMENT ACT of 2003 (Act 663) .
Annually, the Ghanaian government and public institutions enter into many contracts, for the provision of infrastructure, goods, and services.
The Procurement Act regulates such procurement undertaken with public funds.
The guiding principles of the Procurement Act of Ghana are fairness, transparency, non-discrimination, the attainment of a clean process in order to obtain value for money, promote a competitive local industry and increase the confidence of stakeholders in public procurement processes in the country.
In addition to this, the Public Financial Management Act, 2016 (Act 921) enshrines a body of laws to regulate the financial management of the public sector within a macroeconomic and fiscal framework and defines the responsibilities of persons entrusted with the management and control of public funds as well as the accounting and audit of public funds.
Chairman, the question to ask is, have these sets of laws been foolproof for wrongdoing?
The answer is a resounding no!
Indeed, it is the case that wrongdoers will always find a way.
They will constantly devise artful means of evading the long arm of the law.
In spite of these protective measures, corrupt activities occur at various stages in the procurement process.
These unquestionably have a significant negative impact on the economy and harm the development of society.
Insider trading is just one of many unethical behaviors.
Some officials responsible for procurement activities in various public institutions abuse the trust by engaging in what is popularly known as “behind the scenes” business with contractors and suppliers.
The unique position they occupy gives them access to insider information, which they unethically convey to contractors or suppliers to hand an unfair advantage to them over their competitors in a bidding process.
This practice results in dissatisfaction and defeats the principle of fairness in procurement.
The detection of false or inconsistent claims by contractors is hampered by the illicit protection extended by public procurement officers who have the mandate to detect and revise them.
The most chilling, and perhaps shocking case of insider dealing was witnessed when a former head of the Public Procurement Authority was implicated in what was notoriously dubbed “ Contracts for Sale ”.
As the head of the Procurement Authority, he was alleged to have established a company in which he held majority shares and which also actively bid for government contracts.
This company was alleged to usually win the contracts which were then sold to other contractors at a higher price.
The revelation of these acts promptly resulted in the termination of his employment by the President of the Republic and a withdrawal of his membership of various professional institutions and subsequent prosecution which is still ongoing.
The record also shows a trial of other cases involving insider dealing in various courts in Ghana.
Chairman, last year, I spoke about a phenomenon that afflicted the financial sector of Ghana between 2018 and 2020, that is, the emergence of many unlicensed financial entities operating illegally.
I indicated that prominent among such entities was an amorphous organisation operating a microfinance institution under the guise of – guess what - gold trading and illegally using the name of a bank.
It called itself Menzbank, before metamorphosing into “Menzgold”.
It dealt in the purchase and deposit of gold collectibles from the public and issued contracts with guaranteed returns to clients without a licence from the relevant authorities.
The modus operandi of that company highlighted some of the major factors for the success of some fraudsters.
These are ignorance, vulnerability and greed of the victims.
In this situation, the vulnerability and ignorance of thousands of otherwise hardworking Ghanaians was the oxygen for the operations of the company, as we often witness in the case of many Ponzi schemes around the world.
People paid their life savings to the suspects in the case, resulting in losses worth millions of dollars and in some cases, loss of lives.
The misery and distress caused to many homes nearly unleashed a social crisis as riots and demonstrations broke out on the streets of Accra and other parts of the country.
In reality, people lost their homes, and some marriages even broke up as a result of the Menzgold saga.