Kufuor To NIA – Voter IDs Must Be Added To Ghana Card Requirements
Former President John Kufuor has backed calls by the Minority for the Voter ID card to be added to the requirements for registration for the Ghana card.
"Documents that will help identify a citizen as a citizen will be sovereign authority in him or her so if your voter ID is not incorporated…I think it should be added," the former President noted when officials of the National Identification Authority went to his home to register him for the card on Tuesday.
Mr. Kufuor also raised concerns about the time spent on registering an individual for the card.
"Almost for the past two hours, which means it could take a lot of time… when you are going to do it for over 30 million people".
Former President Mahama and the NDC minority in parliament have refused to register for the card over the exclusion of the voter ID card.
"This is a deliberate attempt to de-nationalize some of our people and we shall not accept it. We will use every legitimate instrument that is possible under a democracy to ensure that every Ghanaian is able to register. If you go to one of the villages in my constituency [Bole] and let me use an example, Hodiyiri, it's a small community in Bole Bamboi, perhaps, nobody in Hodiyiri has a birth certificate or passport so for the 300 or 400 people in Hodiyiri with no birth certificate or passport to prove that they are Ghanaians, how are you going to register those people in Hodiyiri?"
"And, so, I don't know, it is illogical and short-sighted and a very strong symbol of incompetence that you cannot think far and see that on the basis of what you have prescribed as a criteria for qualification of the national ID card, you are going to disenfranchise more than 20 million of our citizens and that is unacceptable, and, so, the NDC is going to do everything to fight for the best interest of the majority of the people to make sure they are going to be identified to be given cards so that they can be identified as bona fide Ghanaians," Mahama said in his initial commentary on the development.