President Akufo-Addo has pledged his commitment to free and fair elections in 2024 and assured that he will respect his two-term limit as Head of State.
In an address at the Kofi Annan Peace and Security Forum on Wednesday, December 8, 2021, President Akufo-Addo urged fellow Presidents in the subregion to make similar pledges.
“As president of the Republic of Ghana and current chair of the authority of ECOWAS states in governance, I pledge to continue to respect the tenets of the ECOWAS protocol on democracy and good governance,” he said.
“I will not make or cause to be made any substantial modification to electoral laws in the last six months before the next election. I will respect the two-term limit for the exercise of Presidential authority as stipulated in the constitution of the Republic of Ghana.”
Coming off the 2020 election where he was accused by the opposition of voter suppression and state-sanctioned violence, President Akufo-Addo said further that he “will not be an impediment to the conduct of free, fair and transparent elections.”
“I will hand over power to the next elected president on 7th January 2025, and I will rally my fellow ECOWAS heads of state to take the pledge and support them as they continue to work towards democracy and good governance in the respective countries.”
Ghana has had multiple exchanges of power since returning to Democratic rule in 1992.
But even with over two decades of democracy in some West African countries, President Akufo-Addo admitted that “our member states still remain works in progress as democracies.”
“We must not give up when it comes to guaranteeing the integrity of the electoral process and consolidating peace,” he added.
Source: CNR
