The Chairperson of the Electoral Commission, Mrs Jean Mensa should be allowed to do her job because “I think that” she “is a very good personality”, the founder and leader of the All People’s Congress (APC) has said.

“I think that she will learn on the job”, Dr Hassan Ayariga told Blessed Sogah on Class91.3FM’s ‘State of the Nation’ programme on Wednesday, 18 September 2019, adding: “Definitely she’ll make mistakes, she’ll be corrected but let’s give her the benefit of the doubt, let’s allow her to work and to see the reforms that she will bring on board”.

In July 2018, President Akufo-Addo named Mrs Mensa, who was the Executive Director of the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA), as the new Chair of the EC last year with her deputies being political science lecturer at the University of Ghana, Dr Eric Asare Bossman and Samuel Tettey, Director of Electoral Services in charge of elections at the EC.

The appointments followed the dismissal of EC Chair Charlotte Osei and her two deputies Amadu Sulley and Georgina Opoku Amankwah.

The main opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) and its Minority in parliament kicked against Mrs Mensa’s appointment, describing it as a move by President Akufo-Addo to rig the 2020 elections.

They described Mrs Mensa as a pro-NPP and anti-NDC person who is not fit or the position.

The People’s National Convention (PNC), led by its National Chairman Bernard Monah shared the same sentiments.

Dr Ayariga advised Mrs Mensa not to pander to the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) just because she was appointed by the current government.

“I will say she shouldn’t be too partisan; she should be nonpartisan; she should come out with reforms that will change the course of our political landscape because Charlotte [Osei] was a disaster. Charlotte didn’t do well”.

He said when the “room was given for ladies to perform”, Mrs Osei “abused that power, and for me, I’m not happy with her utterances and her level of arrogance when she was EC Chair”.

“Now, you have an EC Chair and probably she is different, we’re praying hard that she’ll be totally different from what we had in the past and will make sure that going forward, Ghana first than any political party even though she was appointed by the President, His Excellency Nana Akufo-Addo but she’ll work for Ghana and not the President, not for any political party.

“She should use the laws of Ghana to guide her in her role as the boss of the EC and to make changes and corrections and reforms that will transform the EC to make it free, fair and peaceful”.