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THE ELECTORAL Commission (EC) has set August 14, 2012 as the date for the by-election at the Kwabre West Constituency in the Ashanti Region, amid confusion over whether to use the uncertified biometric register or the parliamentary revoked register that was backed by CI 12. While the EC has hinted that it would conduct the impending by-elections at Welansi and Kwabre West constituencies with the old register, the political parties, who are the key actors and stakeholders, have raised objections. Dr. Mathew Opoku Prempeh, the New Patriotic Party�s (NPP�s) Director of Elections, is questioning the basis of the intended action of the EC, raising arguments of legality. He told Kessben FM in Kumasi yesterday that the EC could not use the old register for the impending exercise because it was revoked by parliament and substituted with the recently compiled biometric register which is backed by CI 72. According to him, the commission should have gone to parliament to be given a �special dispensation� if it knew that the biometric register could not be used for the exercise. Dr. Opoku Prempeh, popularly known as Napo, told residents of Kumasi that anyone elected as the successor of the late Emmanuel Owusu-Ansah for the Kwabre West Constituency risked being rejected by the legislature because that would amount to endorsing an illegality. But the Ashanti Regional Deputy Director of the commission insists the EC would go ahead to use the old register for the by-elections because the biometric register had not been completed. Speaking through the same medium, Isaac Owusu said the commission could not truncate the processes of the biometric register, which included exhibition and certification to make it complete. In his view, there would not be any violation of the law as far as the use of the old register was concerned, and that the EC had made that clear. For the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC), its candidate for the Kwabre West Constituency, Kakyere Oppong Kyekyeku, said they at the constituency level were waiting for clearance from their officers at the national level to take a decision. Mr. Kyekyeku, who is also the District Chief Executive (DCE) for the area, said they had prepared for the by-election despite the confusion over which register the EC intended to use for the exercise. The NPP Constituency Chairman, Odeneho Kwaku Appiah, also indicated his party�s readiness for the exercise, but insisted that the NPP could certainly not be a party to an illegal enterprise. �For us, CI 12 has been replaced with the CI 72, and we know that is what we should be using for the election. Anything short of this is tantamount to violation of the law, and we cannot be supportive of this illegal business,� he stressed. Odeneho told DAILY GUIDE that the EC, in one of its advertisement, made Ghanaians to understand that the old register would become invalid after the biometric registration. The disagreement over the voters register to be used for the by-election is seen as awkward for the EC as it is already embarrassed by non-payment of commissions to its temporary officers.