From party campaigns to election referees: Is Ghana’s democracy being put at risk?

Ghana cannot build confidence in its elections on presidential assurances of neutrality. The system for appointing electoral commissioners must itself be independent, transparent and credible.An election can be conducted without proven manipulation and still leave a democracy struggling with a crisis of confidence. That is the danger Ghana faces when appointments to its Electoral Commission (EC), the institution entrusted with managing political competition, become entangled in controversies over the partisan histories of those selected to serve as its referees.