Ghana’s President Nana Akufo-Addo has won reelection in the West African country’s eighth straight democratic election.
Akufo-Addo of the center-right New Patriotic Party obtained 51.3% of the vote in the December 7 election.
He beat his main contender, former President John Mahama of the center-left National Democratic Congress, who polled 47.4% of the vote.
There was only one constituency outstanding when the Electoral Commissioner, Jean Mensa, announced the results that sparked celebrations among Akufo-Addo’s supporters nationwide.
But hours after the declaration of results, the Minority Leader, Haruna Iddrisu, said Mahama’s party had rejected the results.
“We roundly reject and outrightly reject the declaration of the sitting president as the winner of the 2020 elections,” he said. “In due course, our flagbearer will brief the nation and the international community.”
The two front-runners were separated by a little over 500,000 votes.
Out of a total electorate of 17 million, more than 13 million ballots were cast as Ghanaians also chose legislators for the next four years.
The parliamentary race was tighter than expected and the governing party in danger of losing its majority in the Legislature when results are finally declared.
This was the third time the Akufo-Addo and Mahama had faced each other in a presidential election after first facing each other in 2012.
In his victory speech, Akufo-Addo, 76, set his sights on reviving an economy that was grounded by the Coronavirus pandemic.
“My immediate task will be to begin the process of reversing the effect COVID-19 has had on our economy and on our lives,” he said. “Before the pandemic struck, Ghana in recent years was one of the fastest-growing economies in the world, I give you my word, we will regain that reputation.”
Akufo-Addo’s New Patriotic Party campaigned on the need to continue projects it had started, most notably consolidating the free senior-secondary school education policy.
Observers, however, expect the Akufo-Addo’s record on corruption to receive much more scrutiny in the next four years after a series of corruption scandals.
Akufo-Addo also faces an economy riddled with debt and revenue shortfalls with a debt-to-GDP currently at 71 percent.
Mahama is yet to conceded defeat in the election which his party claims suffered from electoral malpractices.
The opposition leader accused the Akufo-Addo administration of using the military to suppress votes and aid rigging but the government denied these allegations.
Before the Electoral Commission came out with its tallied results, Mahama’s party had claimed victory and urged its supporters to hit the streets and celebrate.
“You cannot use the military to try and overturn some of the results in constituencies that we have won. We will resist any attempts to subvert the sovereign will of the Ghanaian people,” Mr. Mahama said at a press conference when counting was still ongoing.
This National Democratic Congress’ apprehension culminated in a peaceful demonstration at the Electoral Commission headquarters in Accra two days after the polls, amid heightened tensions.
Though the election will go down as peaceful, pockets of violence left five people dead.
The Police Administration announced that there had been more than 60 incidents since Monday morning, 21 of which were “true cases of electoral violence.”
The Coalition of Domestic Election Observers, CODEO said its officers reported 254 incidents during the voting process.
“While there were some challenges, these challenges were isolated and did not undermine the process’s overall credibility,” it said in a statement.