New parliamentary and presidential elections will be held in Ghana on 7 December. Incumbent Nana Akuffo-Addo is not allowed to run again after two terms in office; instead, the conservative ruling party New Patriotic Party (NPP) has nominated the current Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia. The most promising rival candidate is the leader of the social-democratically orientated opposition party National Democratic Congress (NDC), John Mahama. He was previously president of the country from 2012 to 2017. Two other politicians are up for election who have a significant share of the vote; Alan John Kyerematen from the Movement for Change and Nana Kwame Bediako from The New Force.
In the latest polls from September, John Mahama is well ahead of Bawumia with 51.1% of the vote, who only has 37.3%. With such a result, Mahama would have been elected in the first round of voting. The other two candidates, Bediako with 6.2% and Kyerematen with 4.1%, would be hopelessly behind. Seven other parties have nominated candidates, but they would only achieve a total of 1.3%.
There are 275 seats in parliament, which are allocated in the electoral districts according to the majority voting system. Here too, the NPP and NDC are the most promising parties. In the last elections in 2020, there was a stalemate in parliament, with the NPP and NDC each winning 137 seats and an independent candidate winning one seat. Nine other parties that stood for election were unsuccessful. The NPP lost 32 seats at the time, while the NDC gained 32, although the NPP's Nana Akuffo-Addo won the presidential election again. A close result is also expected for this year's parliamentary elections. The Volta Region is a safe bet for the NDC. In the last elections, it received around 90% of the votes cast.
Ghana is regarded as a beacon of democracy in Africa. Since John Jerry Rawlings transformed his military dictatorship into a democracy in 1991 (and was subsequently elected president himself twice), there have been several peaceful changes of power and the country's democratic structures are highly stable.
