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Barely a week to the conduct of the December 7 polls, President John Dramani Mahama has hinted of plans to train members of his party to properly cast their votes.

Speaking at a campaign rally at Wassa Akropong in the Western Region, President Mahama said the exercise is to ensure the party gains a wider margin of valid votes cast.

He explained that, after the training, sample of ballot papers would be given to their members to enable them train others.

“This year, I want us to widen the gap. The law states that you can only win with 50% plus, in 2012 we crossed that figure we had 50.7%. But they said the gap was not too much hence the court case which lingered for a while. But if we are able to widen the gap and get 56% or 60% they won’t be able to dispute it,” he added.

Trend of rejected ballots

In the 2012 general elections about 251,720 votes were rejected by the Electoral Commission which made up 2.3 percent of the total votes cast.

Figures from the commission states that as many as 205,438 ballots were also rejected in the 2008 elections. The figure was however more than the votes gained by some of the presidential candidates.

The trend has been a source of worry to stakeholders in the country.

Meanwhile, critics believe that the situation could be reversed through massive voter education exercise nationwide.