The Electoral Commission has denied media reports it has disqualified 24 parliamentary aspirants in the Ashanti Region.

Ashanti Regional Director, Serebour Quaicoe, says the affected aspirants who were among 240 to submit their forms, failed to pay their filing fees as at the September 30, 2016 deadline.

Only aspirants of the National Democratic Congress, Convention Peoples Party, Progressive People’s Party and the Peoples National Convention paid filing fees.

Mr. Quaicoe told Nhyira FM neither the Regional nor the District office has the power to disqualify any aspirant.

His denial follows reports by media portals that some 24 aspirants have been disqualified.

“As I speak, 24 of the candidates have not submitted their deposits and because the districts and the region do not have the power to disqualify anybody, we have made our comments on the forms and sent them to Accra for Accra to know what’s happening. So we cannot disqualify anybody at the district or regional level”, he explained.

He revealed some of the parliamentary candidates who are with political parties failed to pay their filing fees and so too were independent candidates, some of whom have now written officially to withdraw from the race.

According to Mr. Quaicoe he was misreported by journalists at a training programme organized by the National Media Commission in Kumasi, something he does not take kindly to.

Meanwhile, Mr. Quaicoe is asking journalists to be circumspect with their reportage ahead of the 2016 elections.