Ghana’s NDC Party Says Audit Reveals Widespread Vote Padding

The National Democratic Congress (NDC) says its audit has exposed widespread vote padding in favor of New Patriotic Party (NPP) presidential candidate, Nana Akufo-Addo.

Sammy Gyamfi, National Communications Officer of the party, said the party had uncovered occurrences where opposition leader John Mahama’s votes have been reduced, and candidate Akufo-Addo’s votes increased.

Akufo-Addo faced a hung parliament after the opposition secured the last undeclared seat on Friday. The NPP and the NDC both won 137 seats, following the loss of dozens of NPP seats.

The NDC says the math doesn’t add up.

“The first reason why we took this decision is because of evidence of widespread padding of votes in favour of Nana Akufo-Addo that we have uncovered through our audit of the presidential results,” he said told a local news outlet.

He added, “Padding happened mainly at the constituency collation centers where polling station results recorded on the basis of the statement of polls what we call pink sheets are aggregated. So you realised that in aggregating the polling stations votes, more votes are added to the candidate Akufo-Addo in some cases and votes were deducted from the vote of candidate John Dramani Mahama. So the aggregate figure which has been declared by the EC is not reflective of the true outcome because it has been padded.”

Mahama has vowed to contest the results of the “fraudulent” election.

“I stand before you tonight unwilling to accept the fictionalised results of a flawed election,” he told reporters at a news conference. “We will take all legitimate steps to reverse this tragedy of justice.”

“Armed forces featured heavily as an intimidating measure to reverse election results,” Mahama said, calling on the international community “to remain engaged in what is happening in Ghana and to take careful note of the current threat that is being waged to our democracy.”