Yesterday in the early afternoon around 1 PM most of Ghana was tuned into a radio channel or had its eyes glued to a TV screen. Since morning, we had been waiting for the verdict of the supreme court on the election petition. The judges came in and after a few minutes, the courtroom crowd stood up. 8 months of questions about the leadership of Ghana was over.
NDC and Mahama had been confirmed as winners of the presidential election.
Canadian journalist Iain Merlow was in a restaurant as the verdict came in:
““They say we are not meant to celebrate,” the man said, as he sat down for lunch, reflecting the weeks of media discussions about the need for peace, about the need for both sides to accept the verdict without violence or rallies, without over-the-top celebrations or protests. At one point, there was a pretty vigorous media debate about whether there was actually too much talk of peace, whether some were being slightly less than genuine with their peace talk, and whether there was even a need for it all.”
Nnenna followed #theVerdict on social media:
“Oh là là, Ghana Tweeps nailed it. They took pictures, they reported. They tweeted, retweeted, shared, and kept the hype. While we waited for the judges to give #TheVerdict, we even got to the point of asking people to share what they were doing while waiting.. It will be interesting to see a MashUp of the tweets on both tags: #ElectionPetition and #TheVerdict.”
Kwaku Spider checked out the headlines.
“Judgement Day is here”
“D-Day”
Kofi Annan suggested:
“This success must not blind us to the flaws in our electoral system that the judicial review has brought to light. All concerned need to work energetically to ensure that these flaws are addressed through the necessary institutional reforms.
We have a bright future to build together, as the Ghanaian people. That future begins today.”
And taking into account that future, today, some of us bloggers met online in a GhanaDecides sponsored G+ Hangout to discuss the verdict and the election petition’s impact on our country. It was a very constructive discussion with many different opinions shared and challenged.
The discussion is about 1 hour. For a summary, see this Storify put together by Jemila who also moderated the discussion.
The elections 2012 are officially over!
