The Minister for Regional Re-Organisation and Development, Dan Kwaku Botwe has called for total withdrawal of the upcoming December 17 referendum.
The need for withdrawal is over what he said are attacks on President Akufo-Addo’s person.
The sector minister is convinced some persons are unjustifiably hurling ‘tirades’ at the President over government-backed ‘YES’ campaign for the upcoming referendum.
Speaking on Adom FM’s Burning Issue, Dan Botwe believes it is most prudent to cancel the upcoming referendum to stop the disrespect directed at the President.
“If people will disrespect the President for his intention to deepen Ghana’s democracy by relinquishing his power to appoint MMDCEs to voters, then I would advise the President to cancel the whole referendum” he said to the host.”
He, feels the need to completely abandon the whole referendum.
In his view, calls for the referendum to be postponed to enable more stakeholder consultation are not good enough but a total withdrawal of the referendum is better.
His comments come on the back of a call by Assin Central Member of Parliament, Kennedy Agyapong, that the referendum should be postponed to enable better voter education on issues.
But the sector minister maintained cancelling the entire referendum to maintain the status quo would rather help than postponing it.
The December 17 referendum seeks to amend the law to enable Metropolitan, Municipal and District Chief Executives (MMDCEs) and unit committee members to be elected along political party lines.
Article 55 (3) of the 1992 Constitution, which is an entrenched provision, states that “Subject to the provisions of this Article, a political party is free to participate in shaping the political will of the people, to disseminate information on political ideas, social and economic programmes of a national character; and sponsor candidates for election to any public office other than the district assemblies or lower local government units”.