The Former Head of the United Nations Office for West Africa and the Sahel, (UNOWAS), Dr. Mohammed Ibn Chambas has made a case for more domestic election observers to be deployed during subsequent presidential and parliamentary polls.

He believes the move will be the surest way for Ghanaians to own the democratic processes of electing leaders to govern the country.

Speaking to Evans Mensah, host of PM Express on JoyNews, Wednesday, Dr Ibn Chambas said that resourcing local election observers will help in the efficient assessment of the conduct of electioneering process based on national legislation and international standards.

"Going forward, we need to see how we deploy more and more domestic observers. It is part of our ownership of this process, and even before I left the UN that was one of the things I was advocating with Internationals. That we can get more value for money if we can support, put one international observer maybe with a ticket to Ghana. That could give you 20 to 30 if not more, local observers who know the terrain and who can go to more remote areas and ensure that we have a broader spread of observers," Dr Ibn Chambas proposed.

The International diplomat indicated that Ghana has over the years performed creditably in deepening its democratic credentials and called for a review of the 2020 general elections to right the wrongs in order to consolidate the gains made.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3H8laz_JdaE

He also charged the Electoral Commission (EC) to use a more consultative approach in its dealing with the various political parties as well as the management of the electoral process.

"If they (EC) can forward planning as it has done now taking into account recommendations of all the other observers such as the EU, ECOWAS and AU observers. We must combine what the international observers saw and then what the domestic observers also recommended going forwarded" he indicated.

The former UNOWAS boss urged the EC to also take into consideration useful recommendations put forward by the various local and international observer missions that participated in the 2020 presidential and parliamentary elections, with the aim of shaping Ghana's fledgling democracy.