Former President J. A. Kufuor has again emphasised the need for the Electoral Commission (EC) to exercise caution in the creation of the 45 new constituencies. He said his caution was not to wish violence on the nation or to gain advantage for any party, but was based on his experiences as a leader who had had the opportunity to serve the country, as well as other happenings in countries on the continent. “Be cautious for the nation’s sake,” he told the EC at an inaugural workshop for about 26 student leaders of the country’s tertiary institutions. The workshop for the youth, under a programme dubbed Rising Stars, is the first to be organised by the John Agyekum Kufuor Foundation in collaboration with the International Republican Institute. The three-day workshop has the participation of students from the Tertiary Institution Network (TEIN), the Tertiary Education Students Confederacy (TESCON) and the Tertiary Students Charter. Speaking to them, on the theme; “Towards a Peaceful 2012 General Election in Ghana,” the former president said a peaceful election would primarily depend on how the umpire of the elections, the EC, would conduct itself. Using an analogy, former President Kufuor likened the forthcoming elections to athletes in an arena ready to compete. Former President Kufuor said it was important for the EC to uphold what was expected of it as an impartial umpire. “It (EC) must be seen and felt to be impartial,” he maintained. He reminded participants that they had a primary stake in peaceful elections as the youth and reminded them that conflict had the potential of destroying their dreams, with far-reaching consequences. Former President Kufuor also emphasised the critical nature of the 2012 elections, which would define whether the country, with all its human capital endowments, natural and material resources, would catapult citizens into the prosperity envisaged or result in the country remaining in its current state. He charged the leaders to help give leadership in their communities to secure peaceful 2012 elections, and also asked them to engage with each other objectively for a peaceful election 2012 outcome. Representatives of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), the Convention People’s Party (CPP) the People’s National Convention (PNC) and the People’s Progressive Party (PPP) were all absent although organisers said they were invited. The campaign manager of the NPP, Mr Boakye Agyarko, in his statement, said the party was irreversibly and irrevocably committed to the peace of the nation. He, however, said since peace did not naturally come to humans, there was the need for peace to be cultivated. He, therefore, charged the students to cultivate peace and to ensure that peace prevailed in any environment they were in. Mr Agyarko said election tension arose primarily when laws were broken, when laws were arbitrarily taken by the umpire and when there was no predictability with the laws. That, he added, disturbed the state of equilibrium of any environment, and called on the EC to be predictable. He also mentioned portions of the 2010 Kenyan Constitution, adopted after the electoral violence, which made provision for creating boundaries of constituencies and the intervals for doing that, and made a strong case for all to learn from that. A former chairman of the NPP, Mr Mac Manu, who chaired the function, emphasised the fact that leadership was critical in harnessing the potential of the country, while charging the young participants to “let us work towards peace, before, during and after the elections”.