A piece of humour by Martin Egblewogbe

Right. Now that the December 2008 presidential elections in Ghana are finally over, I would like to make a few recommendations for the conduct of the 2012 presidential poll.

(1) All presidential candidates, with the exception of the flag-bearers of the NPP and the NDC, should be allocated an automatic, fixed maximum of 10,000 votes each, apart from Dr E Mahama, who will receive an extra 1 vote on account of his remarkable persistence. Furthermore, the photographs of these other aspirants will not appear on the ballot sheets. This will save money on printing and other logistics, minimize confusion, and reduce the number of spoiled ballots.

(2) The elections should only be held in the Tain constituency, since the rest of the country is split in two and the people cannot make up their minds. Also, the NPP should boycott the election beforehand, in order to speed up the process.

(3) The NPP and NDC should select a small number of their supporters to engage in violence against each other at selected centres in the Volta and Ashanti regions. Video and photographic evidence will then be collected for future reference.

(4) A day before the election, the head office of the Electoral Commission should be relocated to the International Space Station (ISS), from where the Chairman will announce the election results. This arrangement will have the following benefits:
(i) Dr Afari-Gyan, orbiting Earth in the ISS, will take his rightful position closer to God
(ii) Supporters of the NDC and the NPP will be unable to storm the space station
(iii) Court bailiffs will have no access to the EC and no writs can be served

(5) During the period of the elections, all radio and TV stations should be supplied with very low voltage electricity, in order to reduce the power of their transmitters and limit their broadcast range to 100 metres or less. As compensation, they will be supplied with the entire musical works of Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, and Culture -- along with some MJ for optimum relaxation and performance.