January 04, 2009	Sunday	Muharram 06, 1430

ACCRA, Jan 3: John Atta-Mills, 64, will be the next leader of Ghana, the electoral commission declared on Saturday as it announced the outcome of a presidential run-off in the West African nation.

Atta-Mills, running under the banner of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), took 50.23 per cent of the vote, against 49.77 per cent for his rival Nana Akufo-Addo, 64, of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP).

“On the basis of the official results given, it’s my duty to declare Professor John Evans Atta-Mills president-elect of the Republic of Ghana,” electoral commissioner Kwado Afari-Gyan told reporters.

“Victory for the opposition party is a victory for democracy,” NDC member Sekou Nkrumah, the youngest son of Ghana’s first president at independence Kwame Nkrumah, said at the party’s headquarters.

“After eight years in the wilderness, the NDC is back to build a better Ghana”, he said.

A spokesman for the ruling NPP said Akufo-Addo would react to the electoral commission’s statement later in the day.

Meanwhile NDC supporters in white-campaign t-shirts thronged the streets of Accra, cheering and honking car horns.

NDC won a majority of parliamentary seats in legislative elections that held December 7.

NDC is now the largest party in the 230-seat parliament with 114 seats, against 107 for the NPP.— AFP