Keywords

Introduction

Voter participation is a critical aspect of elections and democracy worldwide. One of the benefits of elections in a democracy is higher citizens’ participation and ownership of the electoral outcome (Lindberg, 2006; Lijphart, 2008; Bratton, 2013). Higher turnout rates indicate democratic acceptability and legitimacy of the electoral processes. One of the several processes for voter participation which is one of the contentious issues in Ghana is voter registration. Controversies over foreigners and minors participating in elections in Ghana have been ripe, especially in the Fourth Republican dispensation. These controversies not only are peculiar to Ghana but have become global democratic and right issues. Hutcheson and Arrighi (2015) argue that external voters within the EU region are usually subjected to cumbersome electoral registration processes as a result of institutional frameworks that seek to reduce the impact of external voters on voter outcome. As a result of the growing external voter population in Europe, it can be easy to map out the growing anxiety among the political elites over a population whose voter choice and party affiliations are less predictable and whose domestic outcome of elections may not have a direct impact on them. As such, there is a strong relationship that seeks to transform the true meaning of sovereignty, territory, and citizenship within the member states of the EU.

In a comparative study, Arrighi et al. (2013) found that non-citizen EU members were constrained in the electoral processes of member states on the right to vote and the right to be voted for. Even though the right to vote for representatives in the EU parliament was to be guaranteed for all, it was realized that until an EU citizen is a resident of the territory concerned, his or her right to vote is limited. Aja and Escribano (2019) establish that there are issues with expatriates exercising their franchise in Spain because the process of voter registration in the country is monotonous, making it difficult for nationals abroad to be able to register and vote. According to Sanz (2018), the complexities in expatriates’ ability to register and vote in Spain are further challenged by language barrier and access to information and technology. Palomares and Feenstra (2019) and Ubeda (2018) all recount the difficulties of expatriates’ electorate accessing the voter registration process in Spain. Kralj and Deschouwer (2020) also explore the challenges non-EU citizens face in the registration and voting processes for local elections in Belgium. The authors argue that non-EU citizens’ right to vote is often subject to restrictions that can prevent them from fully participating in the democratic process. This finding is further corroborated by the work of Boone and Verhoeven (2017).

Similarly, Erdoğan (2021) explored the same phenomenon in the Balkan regions, with a focus on the former Yugoslavia, and concluded that access to registration and voting were restricted for citizens living outside its borders, giving an extraterritorial feature to election among member states. Wellman et al. (2022), using an Extraterritorial Rights and Restrictions Dataset, reveal that there is a growing number of extraterritorial voting across the world, coupled with temporal restrictive voting rights. The study found that the expansion of extraterritorial access to voting rights alone does not elicit foreign remittances, but the improvement in the inclusivity of voters in the form of the creation of diaspora representation may do. Studies by Thapa and Adhikari and Lin and Chang further reveal that the challenges of expatriates in accessing the voter registration process and eventually voting not only is a European experience but is also present in Asia, especially in Nepal and Taiwan.

In Africa, this phenomenon is more prevalent in Southern Africa where the study of Fisher and Shmueli (2016) indicates that the feasibility of extending voting rights to non-citizen residents in South Africa, particularly in the context of border towns, is limited. The authors argue that while South Africa’s post-apartheid Constitution guarantees political rights to non-citizens, non-citizen residents are still excluded from voting, which undermines their political participation and representation. Bwalya and Shulika (2019a, 2019b) found that non-citizen residents face numerous barriers when attempting to register to vote in Zambia, including confusion over registration requirements, lack of awareness of the registration process, and limited access to registration centres. Additionally, the study notes that the Election Commission of Zambia’s approach to voter registration often reinforces these barriers, as the agency’s communications materials are often only provided in English, the country’s official language, which is not the primary language of many non-resident citizens. Patrício (2020a, 2020b) confirms this same finding in Mozambique where nationals residing abroad suffer substantial difficulties in registering to vote.

Studies by Abass and Badran and Ndjio and Choubou conclude that in most central African states (such as Chad, the Central African Republic, Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and the Republic of Congo) there is limited access to voter registration centres in border towns where non-resident citizens may reside, mainly due to poor road networks and lack of transportation to registration centres, among other critical challenges. As a result, non-resident citizens are often excluded from the political process, which undermines the democratic principles of these states. The government of Cameroon, for example, has only established a few registration facilities in border towns, making it difficult for non-residents to register. This is also an issue in the Republic of Congo, where just a few registration facilities have been created in border towns, making it impossible for non-resident citizens to participate in the election process.

Similarly, a study conducted in Malawi found that non-resident citizens had limited access to voter education programmes, which made it difficult for them to understand the voter registration process (Banda & Suwedi, 2019). It is of good importance to note that the lack of access to information and awareness is often exacerbated by the distance between non-resident citizens and voter registration centres. A study conducted in Cameroon by Eseme (2016) found that many non-resident citizens were unable to travel long distances to the voter registration centres, and this limited their access to information and awareness. Similarly, in the Central African Republic, Nkoua and Nzita (2018) found that most non-resident citizens lived far away from the voter registration centres, and this made it difficult for them to access information on the registration process.

The review of the literature indicates that voter marginalization of non-citizens and citizens residing in border towns is a typical electoral problem and has been well researched. It shows that though identity has been the major driver of discrimination on voter registration, there are often infrastructure, logistics, and legal frameworks that may interfere with or undermine the process. Ghana faced a peculiar problem in the run-up to the 2020 elections in which major towns, perceived to be the strongholds of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) were prevented from fully participating in the electoral registration and voting process, citing COVID-19 restrictions. This singular act led to accusations and counter-accusations between the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the opposition NDC and the general implication of this on voter suppression, turnout, and electoral outcomes. Using a quantitative method, this chapter examines how being a border community influences the turnout rate in an election. The chapter uses the 2016 and 2020 presidential election results to conduct a cross-sectional design analysis. The main variable of interest is the turnout rate of all constituencies in the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections.

The chapter is divided into five sections. Section one provided the contextual background while section two discusses election trends and patterns in Ghana’s Fourth Republic. Section three discusses the methodology by generating the relevant variables and setting the equations and regressions estimates. Section four presents the descriptive data, analysis, and results and section five provides the conclusion and recommendations.

Electoral Trends in Ghana

Elections and political governance in the Fourth Republic have largely been dominated by the NPP and the NDC, creating a competitive duopoly in the country. Both parties have won four elections out of the eight conducted since the beginning of the Fourth Republic, with a combined voter percentage of not less than 75 per cent of the total votes. Together, the two political parties have governed the country for 30 years with the NPP still left with 2 years to complete its second term after winning the 2020 general elections. A recent study conducted by the Centre for Social Policy Studies (2017) indicated that both the NPP and the NDC will not be able to win elections with first-round votes if only their party members vote for them. At best, and as indicated in Fig. 8.1, each of these two parties will attain a +/− 44–47 per cent. However, political parties require, as per the 1992 Constitution, a threshold of 50+1 per cent votes to be able to win a national election.

Fig. 8.1
A screenshot of presidential election results from 1992 to 2020. It has a dual-line graph that plots lines with mild fluctuations in percentage versus years from 1992 to 2020.

Performance of the NDC and NPP in Ghanaian elections (1992–2020). (Source: Joy FM [2022] EC [2022])

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Deductively, it will require additional votes from either supporters of political parties other than the two parties or non-aligned and non-party card-bearing Ghanaians. This raises several questions: how do we explain the motivation of the Ghanaian voter? Do they vote because of party membership, or do they vote because of something else? If they vote because of other reasons, what could that be? Why do Ghanaians join political parties? Ghanaians who vote for the NPP or NDC are members of those parties or they vote because of something? The literature identifies three reasons why people may cast a vote for a political party: the love of the party (also known as the dominant party model; see Heywood, 2017), the candidate the party selects to lead it in the election, and the policy the party seeks to implement when it wins power.

These factors have been differently submitted in the literature. The policy-influenced alignment has been labelled strategic voting behaviour (e.g. see Cain, 1978; Cox, 1997; Alvarez et al., 2006) and that is explained as voting to influence the policy outcomes in an election. The candidate-induced alignment (also known as personalized voting; see Marsh, 2007) explains membership and voter behaviour based on the personal attributes of the party candidate. Finally, the party-oriented alignment examines the attributes and performances of political parties on the basis of their associations.

Another emerging trend of voter behaviour in the Fourth Republic is that of identity-induced voter behaviour. Studies on voters in Ghana link voter behaviour to ethnicity. Nugent (2001), Arthur (2009), and Frempong (2001, 2004) have reported that ethnicity is a key factor in understanding Ghanaian elections since 1992. Their observation of Ghanaian voters is reinforced by earlier research which attributed voter turnout to the sentiments of ethnicity (Chazan, 1983; Hayward, 1987). Ethnic-based voting is a voting practice that draws strength from the ethnic connection that exists between politicians and voters. The ethnic-based voting is a form of social cleavage model (Sociological Model). The voters here are often fuelled by ethnic connections that are based on family and kinship, language and dialect, ethnic traditions, and indigenous societies in addition to the common religious beliefs that exist among the people. From our review, ethnic-based voting occurs in Ghana at two levels: Ashanti versus Ewe, and Akan versus non-Akan voters.

There is a clear delineation of the two ethnic groups—Ashanti in the Ashanti Region and Ewe in the Volta Region. Since the beginning of the Fourth Republic, the Ashanti and Ewe have consistently voted massively for the NPP and NDC, respectively. Typical example, in the 1992 presidential elections Albert Adu Boahen garnered 30.4 per cent of votes nationally, but in his home region of Ashanti he received 60.5 per cent of votes and this was increased to 65 per cent in 1996 when John Kufuor contested the first time. In the case of Jerry John Rawlings, an Ewe, whereas his national vote was 58.3 per cent of vote, his Ewe ethnic group gave him 93.2 per cent of their votes and even increased it to over 94 per cent of votes in 1996. The Ashanti and Ewe voters have remained ethnic bloc voters for the NPP and the NDC to date. It is significant to note in this respect that while the NPP has not lost more than seven constituencies in Ashanti in any presidential contest (regular or run-off) from 1992, the NDC has won every presidential contest in all constituencies in Volta (including Oti) over the same period (ERRC-Ghana, 2021, Constituency Profiling).

The other category which is Akan and non-Akan is nuanced in delineation as far as voting is concerned. The Akans constitute the major ethnic group in the country with almost half of Ghana’s population. All the others that are not classified as Akan constitute the non-Akan. A vast majority of the Akan ethnic group is most likely to vote for the NPP because they identify with the party as an Akan party which has often drawn its presidential candidates from the Akan group—Albert Adu Boahen in 1992, John Kufour in 1996, and Nana Akufo-Addo in 2008. The majority of voters from the non-Akan group are most likely to vote for the NDC because of several factors including the dominance of the Akan in the politics, economics, and social life of Ghanaians.

While Ghana remains a peaceful country and citizens easily refer to their oneness which reflects in the popular maxim “Ghanaians are one with a common destiny”, the concept “we” and “they” in the Akan and non-Akan in everyday life is a reality which manifests in the voting of the Akan for the NPP and the non-Akan for the NDC. The NDC is seen by some people as “pepefuo” or “ntafou” (people of northern extraction) party. It is, however, important to stress that four regions, three of which are Akan, have become known as the “swing regions” as the two major parties have won elections in these regions at various times. This does not write off the ethnic factor in Ghana’s electoral politics; rather, it has strengthened what some analysts describe as “Ghana’s ethnic fortune” (Gyimah-Boadi, 2003; Frempong, 2019). The performance of the NPP and the NDC in the Ashanti region since 1992 further helps to illustrate this point.

Methodology

This chapter is based on a quasi-experimental research design that uses longitudinal data on voter turnout in all 275 constituencies in Ghana between 2016 and 2020. Specifically, a difference-in-difference quasi-experimental research design was employed to analyse the data. Thus, we exploit on the voting statistics across all the constituencies in Ghana during the 2016 and 2020 elections to explain how border constituencies influence voter turnout.

Research Approach

This chapter employs a quantitative method approach to examine how being a border constituency influences the turnout rate in an election. Since the focus of the study is on explaining the influence of border on voting turnout and causal relationships, a quantitative research method is considered the most appropriate method. We first use a cross-sectional research design to conduct the analysis. The model used to estimate the effect of border on the turnout rate in Ghana is mathematically represented as:

$$ {t}_{ir}=\alpha +\delta Borde{r}_{ir}+\beta {X}_{ir}+\mu +{e}_{ir}. $$
(8.1)

The dependent variable tir is the outcome of interest—voting turnout—for constituency i in region r. Borderir is a dummy or binary variable that indicates whether a constituency shares a border with a neighbouring country. Xir is a vector of other constituency-specific characteristics, including population and rural or urban. μ is a vector of dummy variables to capture differences in outcomes across regions. eir is an idiosyncratic error term. The variable of interest in Eq. (8.1) is Borderir with coefficient δ. If the voter’s registers in border constituencies are replete with foreigners who need voters’ ID cards for other purposes but not voting in elections, then the sign of δ will be negative and significant; otherwise, there should not be any difference between voter turn-rate between border and non-border constituencies.

To understand the impact of border location and COVID-19 pandemic on voter registration and voter turnout, we estimate a difference-in-difference model of the form:

$$ {Y}_{ir}=\alpha +{\delta}_1 Borde{r}_{ir}+{\delta}_2 Yea{r}_{2020}+{\delta}_3 Borde{r_{ir}}^{\ast } Yea{r}_{2020}+\beta {X}_{ir}+{e}_{ir}. $$
(8.2)

In 2020 the COVID-19 pandemic affected all constituencies and would therefore be likely to have reduced the registration and voter turnout rate. This means that the Year2020 is likely to have negative effect on the voter turnout compared to the 2016 elections. Thus, the coefficient on Year2020, δ2, is expected to be negative. Also, as explained earlier, border constituencies are expected to have lower voter turnout rate compared to non-border constituencies. Thus, the coefficient on the border dummy, δ1, is expected to be negative. Moreover, if the voter register in the border constituencies hosts a lot of foreigners, then the negative COVID-19 effect on voter turnout will be more intense for constituencies located on the border. In this case, the negative border effect on voting turnout is further strengthened by the COVID-19 pandemic in the 2020 elections. Thus, the coefficient on the border and year 2020 interaction term are also expected to be negative.

However, in the case of voter registration, we do not expect any significant effect between border constituencies and non-border constituencies. If any, we do expect higher registration rate in the border constituencies as people may have more intrinsic motive for holding voter ID card other than voting. Thus, the coefficient on the border dummy, δ1, is hypothesized to be positive for the case of voter registration.

Data

The sources of the data used in this study are secondary. We utilize the 2020 and 2016 election outcomes data for the study. The main variables of interest include the turnout rate of all constituencies in the 2020 and 2016 voting. We also disaggregate constituencies into border constituencies and non-border constituencies. A border constituency is defined as a constituency that has a land border with another country. We also add population and other characteristics data from Ghana Statistical Service.

Descriptive Statistics

There are 275 constituencies in Ghana. Out of the total constituencies, 53 (19.3 per cent) of the constituencies are along the border with neighbouring countries—eastern border with Togo, northern border with Burkina Faso, and western border with Ivory Coast. Regions that share a border with Togo include Upper East Region, North East Region, Northern Region, Oti Region, and Volta Region. Regions bordering with Burkina Faso include Upper East Region, Upper West Region, and Savanna. In the western border with Côte d’Ivoire are Savanna Region, Bono Region, Western North Region, and Western Region.

Table 8.1 presents descriptive statistics about registered voters and voting patterns in 2016 and 2020. The average registered voter population in Ghana was 61,256, 7.1 per cent higher than that of 2016 of 57,182. Registered voters in border constituencies averaged 44,594 and 47,870 in 2016 and 2020, respectively, compared with 60,187 and 64,452 in 2016 and 2020, respectively, for non-border constituencies. Average turnout rate for non-border constituencies is higher than that of border constituencies: in 2020, for example, whilst the non-border constituencies recorded an 81 per cent turnout rate during the election, border constituencies recorded an average of 77.8 per cent.

Table 8.1 Descriptive statistics
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Findings and Discussion

Land-Border Effect of Voter Turnout in Ghana Elections

Table 8.2 presents the regression results of the effects of the constituency’s border location status on voting turnout in Ghana. The results indicate that border constituencies, on average, have lower turnout rate compared with non-border constituencies. Specifically, border constituencies turn rates were 3.8 percentage points and 3.72 percentage points less than the non-border constituencies in 2016 and 2020, respectively. Given the average voter turnout rate of 73.7 per cent and 83.0 per cent for non-border constituencies, the turnout for border constituencies is estimated to average 70.0 per cent and 80 per cent in 2016 and 2020, respectively. This suggests that many people in the border constituencies may register and obtain the voter ID with no intention of voting during the elections. These electorates are likely to be foreigners with no strong preference for candidates but want to hold the voter ID in order to get some benefits such as health insurance and free secondary school in Ghana. The consistency in the voting pattern indicated by the similarity in the magnitude of coefficients of 3.79 per cent and 3.72 per cent in 2016 and 2020 is quite startling and may suggest the pattern is permanent in nature. The results in Table 8.2 also indicate that constituencies with high registered voters have a lower turnout rate.

Table 8.2 Turnout and Border
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COVID-19 and Border Effect of 2020 Voter Registration and Voter Turnout

In this section, the effect of COVID-19 and the border location of constituencies on election outcomes—voter registration and voting turnout—are discussed. Specifically, equation two is estimated for registration and voting turnout outcomes. Table 8.3 presents results of the difference-in-difference estimates of the two outcomes. The result in column 1 of Table 8.3 indicates that border dummy is negative and statistically significant. This means that, on average, the turnout rate in border constituencies is 2.4 per cent less than the turnout rate in non-border constituencies. The year dummy also indicates that the voter turnout in the 2020 elections was 10.6 per cent more than the voting turnout in the 2016 elections. This suggests that although there was COVID-19 scaring outcome on the voter turnout, the willingness of Ghanaians to vote led to significant improvement in the voting turnout. However, the coefficient of the interaction between year dummy and border dummy, although negative, is not statistically significant. This implies that the 2020 elections did not change voter turnout behaviour for people in border constituencies in a special way that makes it different from the non-border constituencies.

Table 8.3 Turnout and Border and COVID-19
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Conclusion and Recommendations

This study sought to understand the differences in voters’ turnout rates between border and non-border constituencies in Ghanaian general elections. Cross-sectional designs and difference-in-difference methods were used to analyse the voters’ turnout in elections 2016 and 2020. The data suggests that turnout rates in Ghana’s general elections are high when new registers are compiled.

We find that there are significant differences in voters’ turnout rates between border and non-border constituencies. Border constituencies are found to have low voter turnout compared to non-border constituencies. This may suggest that registers in border constituencies may contain foreigners in neighbouring countries who may be interested in voters’ identification cards rather than voting in the general elections. Such individuals would register but would not take the risk in addition to time and monetary resources to enter Ghana to vote on the election day.