2020 polls: Over 6,000 flashpoints identified – Police

The Ghana Police Service has identified  6,1 78 flashpoints across the 16 regions where potential electoral violence could occur before or after the December 7 elections.

The number of flashpoints had increased since the last elections in 2016 when the violence-prone areas were a little over 5,000.

The Ashanti Region tops the latest list with 975 flashpoints followed by the Central Region with 906 flashpoints and Eastern Region with 891 flashpoints.

The others are Accra, 500; Northern Region, 393; Upper East Region, 345; Western Region, 323; Upper West, 292; Western North, 292 and Volta Region, 275.

The others are Oti Region, 261; Tema, 189; Bono, 179; Savannah, 129;  Bono East, 118 and North East, 60.

To ensure security and a peaceful election 62, 794 joint security will be handling the election process across more than 38,000 polling centres, the  Inspector General of Police (IGP), Mr James Oppong-Boanuh, disclosed at a press conference on Wednesday, November 4.

They are drawn from the Ghana Police Service, the Ghana Armed Forces, Customs Division and the Ghana Immigration Service. Personnel from the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) and the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) will also be involved.

The flashpoints were compiled based on incidents in previous elections, crime rate and happenings in during the last registration process.

Police officers deployed to the polling stations will be uniformed and properly identified.

There will be fully armed patrol teams and a standby force for re-enforcements when the need arises.

However, flashpoints will have a different arrangement with the patrol and standby force much closer to the voting areas.

Mr Oppong-Boanuh said he had visited all the regions, and his men and women “are ready” to execute their roles on election day.

Challenges identified with personnel has also been addressed for effective discharge of the duties.

2016 flashpoints

The previous election had 81 constituencies out of the 275 as violent-prone areas.

This was made known by the former Chairperson of the EC, Mrs Charlotte Osei, as she revealed collaborations with the police to handle any chaos.

Electoral violence has not been totally absent in Ghana with pockets on incidents being recorded during.