Stakeholders' participation in Ghana's electoral process: A case study of Weija constituency

Abstract

Active participation of stakeholders in the electoral process is essential for any country to have free, fair and successful elections. Where the participation of stakeholders is not satisfactory, confusion and chaos are normally the outcomes. The study sought to assess the level of participation of stakeholders in Ghana’s electoral process. The study used a total sample size of 167 respondents. These comprised 160 electorate and one key informant each from the Electoral Commission, media, National Commission of Civic Education (NCCE), and four political parties in Ghana. Both in-depth interview and interview schedule were used to collect primary data from the field. In addition to this, purposive, quota and accidental sampling techniques were used to select the respondents. A case study research design was used. The main findings of the study are that voting is the electoral activity that stakeholders participate greatly; better publicity, obeying political rights and the need to strengthen democracy are the factors that influence stakeholders to participate in electoral activities; lack of trust in electoral activities and financial constraints on the other hand limit stakeholders participation in electoral activities. The challenges confronting stakeholders are ethnic discrimination and inadequate finances. It is therefore recommended that there should be much publicity on other electoral activities aside voting for such activities to attract much participation from stakeholders. Financial assistance should be given to stakeholders in Ghana’s electoral system and also the NCCE and the media should educate the electorate on the need to avoid ethnic discrimination in Ghana’s electoral system.