The National Democratic Congress (NDC) Flagbearer, John Mahama, says he will concede defeat if an independent audit of the Electoral Commission’s (EC) election figures proves he lost the December polls
“With the incompetence, the EC has shown, it will be useful for us to do a forensic audit of the EC’s own systems and numbers to come to what the final number from the EC is,” Mr. Mahama said in an interview with VOA News.
“This election, she can’t even get the results right. The declaration is all over the place,” he added.
The credibility of the results released by the electoral management body has also been questioned by some observers following the revision of the total valid votes declared by the EC on December 9, 2020, where EC Chairperson, Jean Mensa, announced wrong figures.
Subsequent communiques from the EC also contained some numerical errors.
Though Mr. Mahama notably became the first incumbent to lose an election in Ghana and subsequently conceded, he said the lapses his party has noted cannot be disregarded.
“The way they have conducted this election; the government, President Akufo-Addo and the Electoral Commission, is a dent to our democratic credentials.”
He stressed that the audit is necessary to “bring closure to this by seeing exactly where the issues are.”
Mr. Mahama, however, assured that if the independent audit done by the EC is satisfactory “I’ll be the first to concede and walk away.”
“As long as that is not done and we know there was a deliberate attempt to subvert the will of the people in favour of the incumbent, it will be wrong for me to just leave it because we will not learn the lessons of this election.”
In the meantime, the NDC has been carrying out an audit of all presidential pink sheets.
The party is claiming that the facts and figures available to it from pink sheets and other evidence across the country shows that there was an attempt to manipulate the results of the election in favour of the incumbent President.