Ghana Presidential race heads to runoff vote

GHANA: Ghana’s Presidential contest heads to a runoff vote Sunday, a race that has become a referendum on whether the West African country’s stunning growth of the past eight years has trickled down to ordinary people.

Neither the ruling party nor the opposition secured enough votes on Dec. 7 to win the presidential election outright in Ghana, one of the continent’s few stable democracies. On the eve of the vote, the two parties traded accusations of possible rigging. Nana Akufo-Addo of the ruling New Patriotic Party received 49.13 percent in the first round. Opposition candidate John Atta Mills campaigned on a platform of change, arguing that the country’s growth has not been felt in people’s wallets. He received 47.92 percent.

The two were among eight candidates seeking to succeed President John Kufuor. On Saturday, Nana Ohene Ntow, general secretary of the NPP, accused the rival party of hatching a plan to intimidate supporters of the NPP in opposition strongholds to prevent them from voting.

Meanwhile, Mills - the opposition presidential candidate - accused the NPP of planning to rig the election, alleging that thugs have been deployed to polling stations throughout the country.

Accra, Sunday, AP