The Ghana Center for Democratic Development (CDD) has admonished citizens to stand firm and reject attempts by politicians to buy their votes in the upcoming general election. Rev Dr Fred Deegbe, a representative of the Centre, urged voters to, in the interest of development, vote wisely devoid of any influence to elect the right leaders to enable them to exact accountability. 'A vote is your will, choice and conscience, taking money means you are selling your conscience and ability to hold leadership accountable,' he cautioned. Rev Dr Deegbe made the remarks at the 10th anniversary public lecture of the Political Science Education Department of the University of Education, Winneba (UEW). The public lecture was on the theme: 'Towards a peaceful 2024 election in Ghana, collaboration among stakeholders in the context of emerging technologies'. He warned Ghanaians of the dire consequences of monetising elections and its processes on development, underscoring the role of citizens in ensuring fair, accurate a nd transparent elections towards national development. He urged stakeholders to educate the public on the negative effects of vote buying on democratic governance of the country. Rev Dr Deebge further entreated the Electoral Commission (EC) to leverage technology to conduct a free, fair, and transparent general election this year. He proposed to the Commission to adopt a system to transmit election results right from the polling stations onto its website to enable citizens monitor and participate in the process in real time. He said such a system would help to check the irregularities which characterised the collation, transmission, and announcement of election results and as a result, the EC would regain the trust of both the electorates and political parties. 'Regaining trust is a process and so, the EC should start building it by updating its website to facilitate the transmission of results directly from polling stations to regional centres, and then to the national level and the website should provi de detailed vote counts for both parliamentary and presidential candidates, with frequent updates whenever there are changes,' he stressed. Beyond that, Rev Dr Deegbe said technology should also be adopted to educate voters, enhance cybersecurity measures, and combat misinformation and disinformation adding that he rise in the malicious use of social media and other pervasive uses of digital technologies remained a threat to the elections and democracy in Ghana and called a concerted effort to address it. He further observed that a multi-faceted approach was required to combat these threats which included the enhancement of media and information literacy identified as one effective strategy to tame it. Rev Dr Deegbe also urged Civil Society Organisations to continue employing data analytics to ensure accuracy and transparency, while the country worked to introduce an electronic voting system in future. He urged all to collectively ensure that Ghana became a beacon of hope after the 2024 elections. Sour ce: Ghana News Agency