Former first lady of the land, Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings, has filed her nomination forms at the Electoral Commission (EC) of Ghana to indicate her preparedness for the 2016 presidential polls scheduled for December 7.
Mrs. Rawlings filed her nomination on the ticket of the National Democratic Party (NDP), a breakaway political party from the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC).
He filing makes it nine presidential candidates who have officially declared their intention to contest the 2016 polls with the electoral management body.
In 2012, the former first lady was disqualified from the contesting the polls after the EC announced that she failed to properly fill out her nomination forms.
Officials of the EC say the forms were incomplete because it did not contain the requisite number of people from across the country to endorse her.
In other instances, those who endorsed did not sign them. E.C officials will also not accept a situation where NDP leaders allegedly decided to sign on behalf of those from various regions who endorsed her forms but failed to append their signatures.
Her entry into the presidential race was therefore denied by the electoral management body.
But Konadu after filing her nomination on Thursday afternoon told journalists that she had no problem completing the forms but bemoaned the proposed GH₵50,000.00 filing fee being charged by the EC.
“If anybody in Ghana who was not surprised about the proposed fee being charged, it is only those who have got a lot of money or stolen a lot of money. The important thing is we want to run a democracy – a democracy doesn’t mean monetocracy”.
“Somebody doesn’t have the money and has the ability to lead their people and you are saying they don’t have the money so they shouldn’t make an attempt? I think it wouldn’t be fair”.
“So, our position is very straight – the fee was way overboard and at the same time it shows that our monetary system in Ghana today has jumped from a thousand to ten thousand. It means that our economy is going down”, she noted.
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