As Ghanaians prepare to get to the polls on December 7, and the race for the number one spot in the country gets hotter, certain developments are giving headaches to the ordinary people. For a country that has seen four successful elections in her recent history, these occurrences cause so much concern.
Not long ago there were some bloody clashes between the two top contending parties the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the main opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), leading to deaths mostly on the side of the NDC and destruction of property costing thousands of Ghana cedis. Certain local offices of both parties were also destroyed in this pre-election violence. A few days ago one local office of the NDC was smeared with human excreta, an act locally referred to as ‘shit bombing’.
Recently, the Former President, Flt Lt J. J. Rawlings held a meeting with past security chief who served during his regime. According to his spoke person the meeting was to discuss the security situation in the country so that they may be able to advise the current government on what to do. This, act is now being interpreted by the government side as a threat to the security of the country owing to the fact that the former president has staged two successful coup d’états in the past before he was elected as president. These past security have now been banned from assessing all security installations.
The result of these is rising tension in the run up to the election. But the only comfort for the ordinary Ghanaian is generally peaceful people and will not allow such situations to degenerate.