TEIN against broad consultation as to who becomes EC chair

The Tertiary Educational Institutions Network (TEIN) of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) has stated that the call on President John Dramani Mahama to broadly consult before appointing a new chairman of the the Electoral Commission (EC) amounts to usurpation of the powers of the President.

‘’If we allow this to happen then we have abridged and diminished the powers of the President,’’ Mr Bright Somiah, the outgoing General Secretary of NDC-TEIN, University of Ghana, Legon branch, declared when he visited the offices of the Daily Graphic last Thursday.

He explained that Ghana was a shining example of democracy on the continent and some of these happenings ought not to be entertained, lest they cast a slur on the gains the country had made so far.

He said when former President John Agyekum Kufuor and late President Evans Atta Mills were appointing justices to the Supreme Court, there were no calls for  broader consultation.

Mr Somiah appealed to those making  the calls not to make what was constitutional unconstitutional and vice versa.

He stressed that the President  had the prerogative to appoint whoever he deemed appropriate to head the institution.

He accused civil society organisations  and think tanks of taking partisan stance on national issues.

Mr Somiah said  some political think tanks, during tenures of certain governments, pressed for certain reforms and actions.

He said the same think tanks, as soon as  a new government emerged, tended to “keep their mouths  shut and cease to exist”.

Mr Somiah observed that the best these think tanks could do was to turn themselves into public relation (PR) outfits and explain government  policies and the need for the people to bear with the government.

He condemned the action of  the group of  lecturers at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology who came out publicly to declare their support for the New Patriotic Party (NPP).