Ghana has made considerable gains since returning to democratic multi-party governance following the transitional elections in 1992. Since then, the country’s successive multi-party elections (seven in total) have generally been peaceful, although with pockets of violence in each election. The accompanying political turnovers (three in total), the most recent being the December 2016 elections without violence, have been quite rare on the African continent and put Ghana as a progressive democratic society among its peers. Besides electoral successes, there is a very vibrant media presence, although recent events and manifestations suggest a curtailment of media freedom as well as decline in popular support for media freedom, according to recent Afrobarometer Survey (2017). Ghana also has an active civil society space and the generally political stability has also facilitated modest economic progress over the past years.
These notwithstanding, there are a number of governance challenges confronting the country such as low citizens’ trust in state institutions and public officials; weak demand for, and supply of accountability; highly pervasive corruption; poor public service delivery; and challenges with implementation of constitutional reform processes. Some of these challenges perennial and new, seem to threaten and undo the progress so far made in the country’s political and economic gains.
On the local governance front, the country has made good progress in a bid to deepen decentralized local government in the areas of administrative and fiscal decentralization. Political decentralization however has seen relatively less progress. One major challenge in political decentralization is the seemingly amorphous structure of the local government system which is rooted in two constitutional provision in the 1992 Constitution. Whilst Article 55[3] bans political parties from participating in local level elections by sponsoring candidates, Article 243[1] clothes the President with the power to appoint Metropolitan, Municipal, and District Chief Executives (MMDCEs).
After an unsuccessful attempt in 2019 to amend Articles 55(3) and 243 of the Constitution to strengthen local governance in Ghana, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) government has recommitted to build bipartisan consensus for passage of the amendments these two Articles. The National Democratic Congress’ (NDC) in their 2020 election manifesto also made similar commitment to the idea of elected MMDCEs.
While Ghana’s electoral successes have attracted enormous international praise, there are still identifiable issues with election management. The credibility and trust of leadership of the Election Management Body (EMB), since the retirement of the Dr. Kwadwo Afari Gyan in 2015 have bedeviled the Commission. There has been, and still is significant public mistrust in the EMB, particularly among the rank and file of the main opposition political parties.
The Electoral Support project aims at consolidating Ghana’s democratic gains by addressing identified challenges in election administration, local governance and conflict management while promoting successful governance and conflict mitigation models.
The project is implemented under a systematic and integrated multi-layered three-phased intervention to achieve the following objectives:
- Improved Integrity of Elections and Political processes
- Enhanced Mutual Accountability in Local Governance
- Strengthened Conflict Management Mechanisms
The expected outcomes for pursuing these set of objectives include stronger governmental accountability to citizens, improved trust in the electoral processes through enhanced integrity and credibility of the process, and an enhanced conflict management and resolution mechanisms for sustainable peace and stability in the country.
