The Ghana Immigration Service has intercepted 23,000 presidential ballot papers in the Ave enclave of the Volta Region which, checks show, were being transported to Akatsi North.
The suspect has been identified as a constituency executive of the opposition National Democratic Congress. According to our checks, he was apprehended at Hevi.
Three booklets of 1,000 presidential ballot papers each were first found on the suspect, Abraham Ahiabu, the serving constituency secretary of the NDC in Akatsi North. Upon a further search, the suspect admitted to possessing an additional 20,000 presidential ballot papers.
The arrest happened around 1pm this afternoon (Thursday 5 December), with two days to go to the general election on 7 December.
According to the officers who effected the arrest, the suspect Ahiabu, when interrogated, claimed he was on his way to Vodome in Togo to “educate voters on how to vote using the ballot papers”.
The Electoral Commission of Ghana will not be conducting elections in Togo.
The suspect described the ballot papers as “dummies”. He has since been handed over to the Ghana Police Service at its Akatsi North District headquarters for further investigations and the evidence has been passed to the police.
Both the NPP and NDC are known to print dummy ballot papers for voter education. However, they usually blot out the photographs of all candidates other than their own party’s choice, to direct voters to the individual their representatives are marketing.