The National Peace Council (NPC), together with the West Africa Network for Peacebuilding (WANEP) and other partners in the Election Situation Room, has urged political parties to withdraw their supporters from the election collation centres to ensure the smooth conduct of the collation process.

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This comes in response to calls from the two major political parties, urging their supporters to converge at the collation centres to protect the ballots, Electoral Commission (EC) officials, and security personnel.The Election Situation Room has expressed concern over this development, which it believes could impede the work of electoral officers, delay the delivery of election results, and heighten tensions at the collation centres.

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The NPC has called on political parties to exercise restraint and allow only their accredited agents to observe the collation process, emphasizing the need for political parties to respect electoral rules and support the professionalism and integrity of the EC.The Electoral Commission (EC) has also reiterated that only accredited individuals will be allowed entry into collation centres across all constituencies.

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This follows reports of residents and party sympathizers attempting to force their way into restricted areas."Currently, a collation of both presidential and parliamentary results is underway in all the 276 constituency collation centres. The Commission wishes to inform the leadership of political parties and presidential candidates that the coalition centres are restricted areas," the EC stated.

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There have been incidents in constituencies such as Ablekuma West, Ablekuma Central, and Okaikoi North, where groups have engaged in standoffs with police and electoral officials as they attempted to observe the counting process.In a press briefing, Samuel Tettey, the EC’s Deputy Commissioner in charge of Operations, emphasized that each candidate is allowed only two agents at the collation centres.

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"Only persons who have been accredited by the Electoral Commission can have access to the constituency coalition centres, and each candidate has two agents at each of the coalition centres. There is no need for the coalition centres to be overcrowded."The EC urged all stakeholders to comply with these guidelines to ensure a peaceful, transparent, and efficient election process.

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