Black Out Disrupts Collation Of Results

Kasoa and its environs Saturday night experienced intermittent power cuts as the Electoral Commission officials began to collate election results from the newly created Awutu Senya East Constituency in the Central Region. Despite assurances by the Volta River Authority (VRA) that there will be no power cuts, Kasoa was plunged into darkness after the second day voting on Saturday night thereby bringing the collation process to a halt. The power went off and on several times and delayed the collation process. Supporters of the two leading parties Dr Adams Nuhu of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and Madam Mavis Hawa Koomson of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) who besieged the collation centre to witness proceedings showed disappointment and anger at the turn of events. The blackout raised suspicions among the NPP supporters that there was an attempt to temper with election results but the presence of security agencies calmed tempers. Out of the 106 polling stations 23 centres recorded electoral difficulties including the breakdown of the verification device that deprived hundreds of thousands of eligible voters from casting their ballots on Election Day thereby pushing voting to a second day. The collation process went ahead after power was later restored and Madam Koomson of the NPP was declared the winner of the Awutu Senya East Constituency. She polled 31,045 votes as against 26,884 by Dr Adams Nuhu of the NDC, who also doubles as the Chief Executive Officer of the Awutu Senya Municipal Assembly. Declaring the winner, the returning officer, Alex Bernard Ankomah said the Progressive Peoples Party (PPP) candidate Rasheed Adu-Gyamfi polled 1,024 whilst Mumuni Iddrisah of the Convention Peoples Party had 124 and Mr. Edward Kwasi Antwi of National Democratic Party (NDP) had 64. In the Presidential election NDC and the NPP obtained 28,228 and 30,481 votes respectively whilst the PPP had 323 and the GCPP 166. The PNC had 30, CPP, UFP and the Independent candidate obtained 29, 27 and17 respectively. Out of the 81,716 registered voters in the constituency, the total vote cast recorded was 59,251 with 1,364 rejected votes.