Top or bottom ballot ranking a big deal in Ghana vote

Ghana’s poll commission held a draw on Tuesday to determine the order for candidates’ names to appear on the ballot paper in the December poll, a key issue in a country with many illiterate voters.

The ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) of outgoing President John Kufuor got the first position, while its leading rival, the National Democratic Congress (NDC), drew third place.

The system has been in operation since 1996 as it is widely believed the place a candidate’s name and symbol occupy on the ballot paper can influence the outcome of the poll, especially for the mainly illiterate rural voters.

“I am very happy, you can’t go higher than number one. It makes it easy for us to educate our people, it’s very simple to show them where to vote,” an exuberant Jak Obetsebi-Lamptey, NPP campaign manager, told AFP.

But NDC chairman Kwabena Adje appeared unperturbed by the third position he picked for his party leader John Atta-Mills, who came a close second to Kufuor in the last election in 2004, arguing the exercise was just academic.

“We are happy with the position because, we are really not depending on this position to significantly change the decision of the Ghananians, they have decided already, there is already a latent verdict that is going to come out irrespective of the .. position we find ourselves on the ballot paper.

Election Commission deputy chairman David Kangah said the current system was introduced in 1996.

“If you are up you have the tendency to market yourself well, and if you are down it’s easy for voters to overlook you, that is why positioning has become so precious”.

Just under 60 percent of Ghana’s adults are literate, according to 2007-2008 figures from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

To illustrate the importance Ghanaians attach to the seemingly insignificant exercise, which in some countries is determined by alphabetical order, the 30-minute exercise got off to a noisy start with some parties questioning why the EC chose to use a transparent glass jug for the draw.

Eventually the parties and the EC agreed to use a plastic ballot box, which although clear, was not transparent.