Chapter 9 The first observation is that despite the increased efforts to educate and sensitize the general public and women themselves, the 2008 elections recorded a decline in the number of female parliamentary contestants. The low number of female candidates can be attributed to reasons that include: the non­transparent nomination processes of the political parties, especially the major political 137 parties, the high cost of filing fees, the commoditisation of political participation and the generally acrimonious political environment in the country. One of the fundamental challenges posed to women's participation in politics is being able to get in at the primaries, which is the entry level for competing(Jonah, 2009). According to the Final Report of the European Union's Election Observation Mission,'the primaries for the parties to elect their candidates were also perceived to work against greater female participation in the elections as they lacked the financial resources to compete on a level playing field with their male counterparts'(European Union Election Observation Mission, 2008). Although the two main political parties, the National Democratic Congress(NDC) and the New Patriotic Party(NPP), decided to reduce the filing cost by half for female parliamentary and presidential aspirants for the 2012 elections, it was still too expensive for many women in a country where access to and control over resources is still largely male dominated. For instance, the NPP required aspirants to pay GHC 6,000(USD4,000). Sitting MPs were required to pay an additional GHC10,000(USD6,667). This means that a female MP who wanted to contest again had to pay GHC 8,000(USD5,333). New female contestants had to pay GHC3,000(USD2,000). Although the filing fees in the NDC were GHC2,000(USD1,333) for men and GHC1,000(USD667) for women, this was still high as many women still suffer significantly greater financial 137 The Coalition of Domestic Election Observers(CODEO) Report on the Pre-Elections Scenario for June 2008, available at http://www.cddghana.org/document/CODEO/Pre-Election mentions the lack of transparent nomination processes. 288