2020 polls: NDC will win only 70 seats – Boahen

The performance of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) will dwindle drastically in the 2020 presidential and parliamentary elections, Nana Obiri Boahen, Deputy General Secretary of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), has said.

According to him, the party will retain only 70 parliamentary seats in the next elections, a drop from the current 103 seats it won in the 2016 elections.

Prior to the 2016 polls, the NDC held the majority in parliament with 148 seats to the NPP’s 123. But the tables have turned – the NDC now has 103 seats as against 170 for the NPP.

At the presidential level, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo won the elections with 53.85 percent of the total valid votes cast to become Ghana’s fifth president in the Fourth Republic, whereas John Mahama, the then incumbent president, managed 44.40 per cent.

Speaking on Asempa FM’s Ekosii Sen on Wednesday January 18, Mr Obiri Boahen noted that given that the NPP won the elections in spite of the intimidation and frustration most of its members were subjected to by the NDC, the 2020 elections would “show the NDC their real size in the country”.

He said: “In 2020, NPP members will be able to do effective campaigning with fear and intimidation from the NDC. They will do the campaign effectively because the police will be more professional in protecting lives and properties. We will cut them to size in the 2020 elections because we will no longer be intimidated by anybody. The NDC will win only 70 seats in parliament.”