Managing Election- Relation Violence for Democratic Stability in Ghana regimes employed populist political rhetoric to garner support from the masses for their unconstitutional interventions in national politics but subsequently failed to maintain this support even among their own rank-and-file. This, in the first instance, reflected the changing circumstances of the Colonel Ignatius Kutu Acheampong era and the eventual change in nomenclature from the National Redemption Council(NRC) to the Supreme Military Council(SMC I) in an effort to save an increasingly unpopular and bankrupt regime. Acheampong's cosmetic endeavours to rebrand his regime failed when his deputy, General Frederick Akuffo led a palace coup and overthrew him, which ushered in the SMC II. The bankruptcy of SMC II eventually led to the failed putsch on 15 May 1979 and the successful first and second appearances of Flight-Lieutenant Jerry John Rawlings in June 1979 and December 1981 respectively. Ghana's accession to constitutional rule in 1992 was marked by a period of intense political campaigning in which populist rhetoric was again used to garner votes and mass support. This'tradition' that was started by Nkrumah, has been used in the political sphere of Ghana ever since. This paper thus traces the history of populism in Ghana with a view to gauging whether it has resulted in a particular type of politics in Ghana, and its implications for peace and security before, during and after elections. Populism and Populist Political Discourse in Ghana Populism is a label that has been applied to the style of crowd­pleasing politicians who are hard to distinguish from demagogues, and who make promises – political, economic, social – no matter how unattainable, as long as this practice advances their cause, and who will tweak legal procedures 64