A former Deputy National Youth Organiser of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), Edem Agbana, has been declared the legitimate winner of Saturday’s parliamentary primary held in the Ketu North Constituency of the Volta Region.
The national leadership of the NDC announced through its General Secretary, Fifi Fiavi Kwetey on Tuesday, May 16,2023, after the party’s Functional Executive committee probed the dispute.
There was misunderstanding on Saturday between Edem Agbana and his contender, John Adanu Zewu after a tie.
The vociferous former National Youth Organiser was declared the winner by just a vote, but after two recounts upon the request of his opponent, the Electoral Commission established that three ballot papers had not been stamped.
It emerged later that two out of the three unstamped ballots were cast in favour of Edem Agbana, and one in favour of John Adanu.
Despite this, Mr Agbana insisted that he had won with 360 votes against his opponent’s 359 votes although the EC did not declare him winner.
There had been reports suggesting a possible rerun of the polls in that constituency, but the NDC at a news conference in Accra on Tuesday, delivered a verdict on who the legitimate winner was.
The General Secretary, Mr Kwetey explained that the said unstamped ballot papers were part of the original ballot booklet provided by the party and so there was no over-voting.
“By and large, we got a consensus coming across the table that the ballot papers [in question] were an integral part of the booklet of ballots that came from the national office that went to that constituency. And therefore they were not foreign materials. We also checked and saw that there was no over-voting. The tallying process done by the agents of the candidates tallied with all the ballot papers found in the ballot box.
“These for us were the pieces of information we wanted to ascertain. So the ballot papers were authentic… Following this, we are of the position that, the will that the voters expressed is the authentic will of the people. That original result had candidate Edem Agbana having 360 votes, followed very closely by candidate John Adanu who had 359. Very close as it was, we had to go by the will of the people of Ketu North.”
“So we want to tell you that, at the end of the day, the committee headed by the National Chairman of the NDC, aided by my own self…that the will of Ketu North was that Edem Agbana was the one that won the most number of votes on the day. Even though it was that close, Edem Agbana will be declared the winner,” Mr Kwetey noted.