The Department of Political Science Education at the University of Education, Winneba as part of activities to mark its 10th Anniversary celebration, organized a Public Lecture under the theme, “Towards a Peaceful Elections in Ghana: Collaboration Among Stakeholders in the context of Emerging Technologies” on Thursday, November 8, 2024 at the Kwadwo Baah Wiredu Lecture Theartre at the North Campus of the University.
The Lecture which sought to rally relevant stakeholders in elections to explore and develop innovative strategies for ensuring a peaceful and transparent electoral process in 2024 as well as leveraging on emerging technologies to enhance collaboration and trust among the citizenry brought together stakeholders including political parties, electoral bodies, civil society organizations, technology experts, students as well as persons in academia.
Delivering an address at the Lecture, the Municipal Chief Executive for the Effutu Municipal Assembly, Hon. Alhaji Zubairu Kassim underscored the importance of working together to have an electoral process that is genuinely free and fair to receive the total trust and confidence of the Ghanaian electorate. He noted that the governing New Patriotic Party was committed to collaborating with relevant state institutions for an electoral process in which losers would concede graciously to congratulate the winners, and go back to reorganize to seek more persuasive ways of convincing the electorate in future elections.
According to him it rests in the interest of the political parties that the country does not only witness an absence of violence, but that there is no tension in an atmosphere which is truly peaceful at all levels.
Hon Zubairu Kassim touched on the critical role the media plays in the dissemination of information and charged them to prioritize leveraging on technology to guard against misinformation and hate speech knowing their impact in the sustenance of peace before, during and after elections. He encouraged Media practitioners to make a strong case by updating themselves on international norms and standards regarding freedom of expression to augment their understanding of hate speech and its impact particularly in a season of Ghana’s electoral activities.
The Effutu MCE admonished Journalists to build their capacity on significant changes in journalism with emphasis on the importance on preparing adequately to navigate evolving dynamics in their field of work.
He challenged media practitioners to leverage on technology to live up to their core responsibilities of protecting and deepening the country’s democracy for good governance by fact-checking information to ensure they positively impacted the nation as well as citizenry.
Hon. Zubairu Kassim intimated that, there was the need for Ghanaians to adopt to the digital era with a swift rise of artificial intelligence which presents opportunities and challenges to elections in this part of the world as the country gears up for election 2024. He also entreated the electorates to be proactive in the usage of inartificial intelligence by making sure that elections in this digital era contribute to peace building and progress rather than undermining the country’s very existence.
In the opinion of the Effutu MCE, the security agencies should strategically employ technological advancement to collaborate with other relevant state agencies to identify and clamp down on potential hot spots and crimes before, during and after the 2024 Elections.
The Keynote Speaker and former General Secretary of the Christian Council of Ghana, Rev. Dr. Fred Deegbe, appealed for a periodic security audit of the Electoral Commission’s cyber software to avert possible threats by cyber criminals for a more robust system needed for a free and fair elections outcome.
He advocated for more public awareness campaigns on the election processes to cure the mischief attached to misinformation.
Rev. Dr. Deegbe advised political parties and the general public to use social media positively to safeguard the peace of the country. He called on Ghana’s Electoral body to adopt the Coalition of Domestic Election Observers’ (CODEO) proposal for the usage of technology in transmitting election results from polling stations to the strong rooms of the Commission. This according to him will help to reduce the human factor to end the mistrust and build the confidence of the people in the process of elections in Ghana.
STORY BY: CHARLES BAAH ABOAGYE -ISD
Last modified: August 8, 2024
