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Eight Contenders Seek Ghana Presidency on December 7th


Ghana-flags.jpgIt's game time once again in Ghana's political arena.  Thirteen million registered voters in the 92,000-square-mile West African country, just a little smaller than Michigan, go to the polls Dec. 7 to elect a president and 275 parliamentarians. All will hold four-year seats. Eight candidates are running for the president's post.
 
The international political community always watches the Ghana elections because the country likes to think of itself as a model for democratic rule among Africa's 15 nations.
 
Ghana asserted itself on March 6, 1957, as the first country in black Africa to wrench its independence from Great Britain. When that happened, Ghana became the torchbearer of the black race and a global center of political attention in Africa.
 
Former UN Secretary General Dr Kofi Annan was recently quoted in the Ghanaian media as saying, "When elections are conducted with integrity, without being disfigured by election motivated violence, which is democracy."
 
Ghana has held five successful presidential and parliamentary elections since 1992 while violence, corruption and political turbulence surfaced in many other African state elections.
 
If no presidential candidate receives an absolute majority of 50 percent plus one vote on Dec. 7, a run-off election will be scheduled for Dec. 28.  Parliamentary candidates win by a majority vote.
 
Vice- President John Dramani Mahama, now Ghana's president after replacing John Atta Mills after his July 24, 2012 death, will be running as presidential candidate of the National Democratic Congress in this election.[
 
In addition to the incumbent, the other competing candidates include Hassan Ayariga, Papa Kwesi Nduom, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, Michael Abu Sakara Foster, Akwasi Addai Odike, Jacob Osei Yeboah and Henry Herbert Lartey.
 
Ghanaians expect the voting once again to be orderly and incident-free, especially after what the country's National Peace Council orchestrated on Tuesday, Nov. 27th in the cultural capital city of Kumasi in the Ashanti Region of Ghana, and within the premises of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KUNST). Ghana political observers say the occasion was unprecedented in the political history of Ghana, if not in Africa.
 
The National Peace Council, under the auspices of the modern Asante King, Otumfo Osei Tutu II, and with the technical and administrative support of an Accra -based Institute for Democratic Governance, summoned all the presidential candidates to a rare meeting to pledge to the people of Ghana that they would uphold peace, before, during and after the elections.
 
All eight presidential candidates responded to the call and publicly signed a declaration to ensure peace during the Dec 7 voting.
 
They were President John Dramani Mahama, the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Dr Henry Lartey, the Great Consolidated Popular Party (GCPP), Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, New Patriotic Party (NPP), Dr Paa Kwesi Nduom, Progressive People's Party (PPP), Mr. Akwasi Addai, United Front Party (UFP), Mr. Hassan Ayariga, People's National Convention (PNC), Dr Abu Sakara Foster, Convention People's Party (CPP), who was represented by his running mate, Madam Akosua Frimpomaa Sarpong Kumankuma and Mr. Joseph Osei Yeboah, Independent candidate.


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