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Avert election disputes …EC deputy chair to GJA

The Deputy Chairman of the Electoral Commission (EC) in charge of Operations, Dr Serebour Quarcoe, has urged the incoming leadership of the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) to learn from this year’s elections.

He said the myriad of challenges that have preceded Friday’s elections, including months of litigations, should serve as a lesson so that they put measures in place to prevent recurrence in the future.

He said journalists were known to be a voice of the society and litigants, “so you have a lot of things to put in place going forward such that the next elections you will not have to go through what you are going through today.”

Dr Quarcoe gave the advice on Monday at the Ghana International Press Centre in Accra when he supervised the balloting for positions on the ballot papers

for the GJA national executive elections.

According to Quarcoe, at some point in time, a litigation must come to an end, stressing that “if we want to solve every problem, then it will take the next 10 years before we will be able to hold the GJA elections.

“In any case, whatever have been the challenges, we are ready to hold the elections this Friday. So for those of you who thought the elections would not come off, please disabuse your minds because they will indeed come off as scheduled.

“It is against this backdrop that we are organising this balloting exercise,” he added, Dr Quarcoe said.

A total of 11 people are contesting the GJA’s Presidency, General Secretary, Organising Secretary and Public Affairs Officer positions.

The contestants has been crisscrossing the country to meet with members of the GJA to solicit their votes in the Friday’s polls.

Speaking with the Ghanaian Times in an interview, Mr David Agbenu, a Presidential aspirant of the GJA, said he was hopeful that delegates would give him the nod on Friday to be able to give the GJA to the highest level of leadership for which all members would feel a sense of belonging.

He said the time had come for the GJA to move from a dependence syndrome to one of self-reliance and as such, “the safety and protection of all members will be  a top priority”.

BY NORMAN COOPER

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