The Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) and political parties in the country have agreed to enforce Biometric verification ahead of the 2016 general elections.

The agreement is contained in electoral reform proposals submitted to the Electoral Commission (EC) on Tuesday, November 26.

Key among the proposals is the authentcation of finger prints before a person is allowed to vote.

The Ghana Political Parties Programme (GPPP) under the auspices of the IEA also recommended that there should be no review of constituency boundaries in an election year.

The IEA-GPPP initiative follows the Supreme Court's ruling on the landmark election petition hearing that proposed reforms in the country’s electoral system.

The opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) challenged the 2012 presidential election in court citing massive irregularities during voting in spite of the introduction of biometric verification.

After months of litigation, the Supreme Court affirmed the legitimacy of President John Mahama but asked that the country’s election system be reformed to avert any court action in future.

 The IEA together with all political parties in the country believe that maintaining the biometric verification will ensure free and fair elections in future.

Speaking to JoyNews, former Chairman of NPP, Peter Mac Manu said the agreement was to reinforce the importance of biometric verification as captured in CI75 article 30/2.

According to him, political parties have taken up the challenge to ensure future elections are “transparent, credible, civil and peaceful, which results will be accepted by all”.

“We are trying to perfect the challenges in the 2012 election particularly after the election petition so those that are good will be maintained and the bad ones will be reformed”, Mr. Manu stressed.

Additionally, Mr. Mac Manu, who represented the NPP on the Ghana Political Party Programme , expressed the NPP's endorsement of all the recommendations presented to the EC.

Also, the Deputy General Secretary of the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC), Kofi Adams said they will abide by all the recommendations.

“The NDC has been committed to improving the electoral process and will always continue to abide by that. We have only championed such reforms that will improve the electoral process” Kofi Adams noted.

This, notwithstanding, Kofi Adams said the NDC disagreed with the proposals to limit the term of the Commissioners of the EC and electronic voting (e-voting).