General Secretary of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), Johnson Asiedu Nketia, has debunked claims that his plan to contest for national chairman of the party will cause strife in the party.;
According to Asiedu Nketia, the only time in history that the NDC lost elections due to internal wrangling was when the elders of the party try to force their candidates down the throats of delegates.
“… Those saying that people contesting in the chairmanship position or the General Secretary position will lead to trouble are not being factual. Nothing like that will happen, the history of the party does not bare them out,” he said in an interview on Radio Gold.
“There have been only two occasions where we have had divisions in the party after congress. The first one was an attempt to gag everybody else for the leaders to take decisions for the party, during the Swedru declaration where President Rawlings declared that Prof Mills should be the flagbearer of the party after him. Even parliamentary candidates were imposed and this led to some group in the party forming their own party (the Reform Party). This made us lose the 2000 Elections.” Nketia said.
“The second time was in 2005 when I was part of the national executives. During that time the National Chairman of the party before the congress wanted his own set of executive and the party insisted there should be an election at the congress. Again, after congress there was a split which led to the party losing in the general elections,” he said.
His comments come after former National Organiser of the NDC, Yaw Boateng Gyan, said in an interview that Asiedu Nketia should be dissuaded from challenging Samuel Ofosu-Ampofo for the party’s national chairmanship position to preserve unity.
“We will need the two in the party going into the 2024 elections, and just as we did for the first time in 1992 in Cape Coast, where the party elected national officers based on consensus, the same can be done with the two,” he said.
“We are in the party, and we know that a lot of things happen, so if we fail to put down proper measures, things will go bad for us.” he ominously added.
Source: theGhanaianVoice.Com