In Ghana’s 2024 elections, the real story was not who won but who stayed home.
Nearly seven million registered voters, close to 40 percent of the electorate, chose not to cast their votes. This was the highest rate of voter disengagement since the start of the Fourth Republic.
Together with a team of senior researchers, we undertook a nationwide study to understand this phenomenon. Data for the study was collected in March 2025. Voter apathy, in this study, refers to the deliberate abstention from voting by registered and eligible voters.
What we found was quite revealing. This was not laziness or confusion. It was a silent but deliberate protest against perceived failures of governance and economic management.
Some key findings:
• Seventy percent of non-voters were experienced voters, many of whom had participated in the 2016 and 2020 elections.
• Eighty-three percent of those who stayed home cited dissatisfaction with governance failures (43 percent) and economic hardship (40 percent).
• Only ten percent mentioned poor infrastructure, and even fewer cited voter ID or travel issues.
Would the NPP have won if these voters had participated?
Not necessarily.
Our data show that even if non-voters had turned out based on their historical patterns, the NPP would have narrowed the gap but still lost by about 470,000 votes.
When considering their actual 2024 political preferences, the NDC would still have won, although by a smaller margin of about 384,000 votes.
Education was no shield against disillusionment.
Even among voters with secondary and tertiary education, frustrations with governance and unmet promises led many to stay home or shift toward opposition parties.
Educated non-Akan voters, particularly among the Ewe, Mole-Dagbane, and Ga-Adangbe groups, moved strongly toward the NDC, while educated Akans showed weakened loyalty to the NPP.
The role of the media was decisive.
Perceptions created through radio, television, and especially social media deeply influenced how voters viewed leadership.
In many cases, perception became reality, regardless of official narratives.
Perhaps most sobering, only 19 percent of non-voters regretted their decision.
Four out of five either stood by their choice or were indifferent to the outcome.
The lesson is clear.
Rebuilding trust requires more than promises.
It will take humility, credible leadership, effective governance that touches real lives, and active engagement with the youth and educated electorate.
As we move toward 2028, we must remember that today’s voters, especially the young and educated, demand not just policies but integrity in leadership.
Disclosure:
This research was conducted by a team of seven senior researchers from the University of Cape Coast, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, University of Energy and Natural Resources, and the University of Education, Winneba.
The study was led by Dr Emmanuel Marfo, former Member of Parliament for Oforikrom and former Research Scientist at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research.
The findings presented here are based entirely on independent empirical analysis.
~Dr. Prince Hamid Armah
