Nana Akufo-Addo, the candidate for opposition NPP, is officially the President-elect of Ghana after the incumbent John Mahama called him on Friday night to concede defeat.
President Mahama and his NDC party had earlier rubbished claims by the opposition NPP that they are in a commanding lead with over 54 percent of the votes in Wednesday’s polls.
But projected results put the long-tested politician in an unassailable lead, thrashing the incumbent Mahama of the ruling NDC for a one-touch victory with 54% emphatic lead.
The electoral commission has yet to release from this week’s elections but the with defeat starring at him in the face Mahama has accepted his fate.
Seven candidates were contesting Ghana’s presidency and the emphatic victory means there will be no run off.
Akuffo-Addo secured more than the required 50% plus one vote to coast the Flagstaff House.
The election has tested the Ghana Electoral Commission and its new Commissioner Charlotte Osei.
Observers reported almost no major problems on election day but the NPP and the National Peace Council on Thursday urged the commission to start releasing results quickly.
Akufo-Addo, a Ghanaian politician who ran for President of Ghana in the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections and failed, ​has now secured the much needed votes to get into office.
Mahama is running for a second and final term in office against the backdrop of an economy that has slowed since he took office in 2013, in part because of a slump in global prices for its exports of gold, cocoa and oil.
Akufo-Addo, a former foreign minister, has focused on Ghana’s economic woes as a campaign theme, and has repeatedly accused Mahama and the NDC of incompetence.
The winner will serve a four-year term in the former British colony, a once booming country that has seen its economy slow, currency deteriorate and inflation soar.
Tensions were palpable after the election was tainted by sporadic violence in a country once hailed by US President Barack Obama for its peaceful transitions of power.
Independent observers said that the “polling and counting processes were generally credible”.
Mahama, who came to power in 2012 after beating Akufo-Addo, has urged voters to “stay the course”, promising to deliver more infrastructure projects.
Akufo-Addo is making his third bid for the top job.
His NPP has blasted Ghana’s poor economic growth rate — estimated at 3.3 percent in 2016, the lowest rate for two decades — and laid out a radical vision to transform the country’s economy.
Ghana is the world’s second biggest producer of cocoa after Ivory Coast and Africa’s second biggest gold producer after South Africa.
But it was forced to turn to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in 2015 for a bailout as global commodity prices tanked.
Ghana’s elections have been historically close, with Mahama narrowly winning in 2012 with 50.7 percent. Akufo-Addo unsuccessfully challenged Mahama’s victory in the courts.
Manji Cheto, senior vice president at Teneo Intelligence analysts, said Ghanaians appeared to have used the polls as a protest vote.
“These elections have demonstrated yet again that Ghanaians believe the polls to be the most effective way to send a clear message to their leaders about their displeasure,” she said.
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