It’s officially election season in Ghana.
On December 7th, Ghanaians go to the polls to elect a new president for the next four years. Ghanaians will also be voting for members of parliament.
For many, the popular choices for this year’s president are the current vice president Mahamudu Bawumia and the former president of the opposing political party, John Mahama.
For this piece, we’ll be giving some historical data for Ghana’s voting patterns in previous elections for both presidential and parliamentary elections.
Presidential Elections
For the upcoming polls, 13 candidates are vying for the presidency.
Historically, two major parties win the presidential elections: the National Democratic Party (NDC) and the National Patriotic Party (NPP).
No third-party candidate in Ghana’s history has been able to garner 200,000 votes in a major election.
Parliamentary Elections
Ghana currently has 275 Members of Parliament (MP). The current parliament has no majority party with both major political parties of the NDC and NPP having 137 MPs with one independent MP.
When we zoom in, Ghana's parliament is mostly male-dominated. The parliament in 2024 currently has 40 female MPs, making up 14.5% of Ghana's Parliament.
In the upcoming election, only 120 women are contesting parliamentary seats out of more than 800 candidates nationwide.
Ghana's Voting Record
This year, the total number of registered voters is 17,027,641. The country has the highest turnout for voting in 2020 with about 78.9% turnout. The total number of registered voters was 17,027,941 and the total votes cast was 13,432,857.
Winners and Losers
So who wins in this year's elections?
A polling firm called Global Analytics currently favors John Mahama of the NDC as the winner in the presidential race. According to their polls, John Mahama is leading with 53%, while Bawumia trails at 31.6%
Fitch Solutions also predicts that the NDC candidate John Mahama will win the presidential elections.
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