Ursula Owusu and Victoria Hammah
CONFUSION rocked the Ablekuma West constituency during counting of the ballots at the end of polls last Saturday leading to heavy security presence at the Dansoman Police Station which served as the collation centre.
Victoria Hammah, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) parliamentary candidate challenged the results of the polls accusing one of the presiding officers of tampering with the figures in favour of Ursula Owusu, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) candidate.
As a result, some NDC leading members such as Ade Coker, Prince Eric Adjei, and Chris Ackumey who were at the centre called for a nullification of the results.
This generated confrontation between the two parties? officials with the NPP officials calling on Electoral Commission (EC) representatives to declare the results in favour of Ursula against the wishes of Victoria.
The continuous resistance of Victoria delayed the EC?s declaration of the winner which could have been done earlier around 9:00pm.
This consequently angered the NPP supporters who started to chant war songs such as ?we want peace, kyikyiri nooo kyikyiri Satan bo dadie no mu ma me,? to wit tie the devil against a tree for me.
DAILY GUIDE learnt that Victoria during her campaign promised to build a ?soobolo? factory to give employment to unemployed people in the area. This statement which the supporters described as demeaning infuriated the crowd who continually hooted at Victoria calling her ?soobolo MP.?
The behavior of the supporters raised security concerns leading to the call for military reinforcement to calm down the situation.
Victoria was whisked away by the security officials to avoid her being manhandled just before the results were to be declared.
When calm was restored, Ursula Owusu and Nana Addo Danquah Akufo-Addo, the NPP presidential candidate were declared winners with 36,975 and 36,383 votes respectively around 12:20am.
Victoria Hammah polled 26,153 votes and the NDC presidential candidate, John Mahama had 25,185.
The NDC agents however refused to endorse the results because they complained there were voting irregularities and that there was evidence that the seal of one of the ballot boxes was broken in their absence.
Ursula after being declared the winner said she was happy about her victory as the first candidate for the new constituency and promised to do her best to bring development to the area.
By Mary Anane & Lady Agyapong
