EC to rerun 19 Ablekuma North parliamentary polling station elections

The Electoral Commission (EC) will conduct a rerun in 19 polling stations currently in dispute in the Ablekuma North Constituency to conclude the 2024 parliamentary contest in the constituency.

The decision was made after extensive deliberations by the elections management body with the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and the New Patriotic Party (NPP) at a meeting in Accra last Tuesday.

The rerun election will be held on Friday, July 11, 2025, at the affected polling stations, with the EC calling on the state to provide the needed security to ensure a safe environment for the conduct of the election.

A statement signed and issued by the EC’s Deputy Chairperson in charge of Operations, Samuel Tettey, yesterday named the affected polling stations as God First International School at Darkuman (1); Pentecost Church Mount Zion Assembly at Kwashieman; DVLA Office at Awoshie Adamami; Asiedu Gyedu Memorial School at Awoshie (1); Living Spring Day Nursery at Kwashiebu (1); The Lord’s Pentecostal Church at Kwashiebu; the Presbyterian Church at Odorkor (4); Church of Pentecost at North Odorkor (2); Church of Pentecost at North Odorkor (4); Methodist Church at Odorkor (1), and St John the Baptist Catholic Church at Odorkor (1).

The others are Radiant Way Preparatory School at North Odorkor (2); Ateco School Complex at Odorkor; South Odorkor 4 & 5 School (3); Church of Pentecost at Tweneboa (2); Light of Gospel Miracle Chapel at Tweneboa (2); MTTD Odorkor Divisional Station (1); Roman Catholic Church at Busia Junction at Odorkor (1), and Bethel Baptist Church at Sakaman (1).

Reason for rerun

The contending parties were in dispute over the results of 37 polling stations, either having their own issues over the acceptability of the results.

The EC explained that the rerun had become necessary because results from the 19 polling stations, although approved by agents of both political parties, were not verified by the presiding officers responsible for those stations.

It said the commission decided to rerun the election in those disputed polling stations “because the 19 scanned polling station results used for the collation, though approved by agents of both political parties, were not verified by the Presiding Officers responsible for those polling stations”.

Meeting

The statement said last Tuesday’s meeting was a follow-up to an earlier one held on Thursday, June 12, 2025, which provided both political parties the opportunity to brief the commission on any new developments regarding the constituency.

The parties, it said, informed the EC that their positions put forward at the last meeting remained unchanged.

While the NDC held the view that the election should be rerun in 37 polling stations because scanned pink sheets from those 37 polling stations used to collate the results were provided by the NPP, the NPP was of the view that the results from only three polling stations remained outstanding for a winner to be declared since the NDC agents had verified and confirmed the scanned polling station results they presented.

“It is important for the public to understand that the issue in contention has to do with the fact that 37 pink sheets provided by the NPP and used to collate the results were scanned copies,” it said.

Recall

Political party supporters besieged the EC’s collation centre and destroyed a number of the pink sheets for the Ablekuma North parliamentary election during the collation of results following the December 7, 2024, general election.

In the early hours of December 17, 2024, a fire outbreak ravaged parts of the Kwashieman Cluster of Schools in Accra, destroying the December 7, 2024, ballot boxes and their records for the Ablekuma North Constituency kept at the school.

The contest for the Ablekuma North parliamentary seat is between Nana Akua Owusu Afriyie of the NPP and Ewurabena Aubynn of the NDC.

Ms Aubynn was declared the winner of the Ablekuma North Constituency based on 219 polling stations, but the EC overruled that and ordered the collation of results of the remaining 62 polling stations in the constituency.

That decision was endorsed by the High Court in Accra, which ruled against her election due to the incomplete collation of results.

However, the collation of the results was truncated seven times over issues of the inability of the EC to authenticate some pink sheets, coupled with some presiding officers’ disagreement with pink sheets produced by the EC and political parties, citing changes and inconsistency in figures on the pink sheets.

At the last meeting, the returning officer of the Ablekuma North Constituency served notice that he would not continue with the process at the risk of his life.