Akufo-Addo clears air on alleged memory loss

It has now emerged that nowhere in his speech in Kumasi did Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo say that there were 230 Members in Ghana’s Parliament, as reported by pro-government tabloid, Daily Post and other NDC propagandists on social media networks.

The pro-NDC paper claimed that Nana Akufo-Addo, two-time standard-bearer of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), told delegates at the Georgia Hotel in Kumasi last Friday that there were 230 MPs in Ghana’s Parliament instead of the 275, attributing it to memory loss on the part of the NPP strong man.

Office of the Nana Addo has since made the tape-recording of the speech he delivered on the occasion available.

Apart from the fact that it has been uncovered that the paper lied about the date of the event which it quoted as Saturday, September 20, 2014, it has emerged that Nana Addo indeed said there were 275 MPs to make a point.

On the said tape – a copy of which has been made available to Daily Guide – the man was heard loud and clear expressing surprise at utterances by those who sought to ridicule his victory in the special delegates’ congress because they claimed the 740 delegates who voted in that elections were insignificant, as compared to the 140,000 expected to vote in the NPPs upcoming October 18 congress to elect a flagbearer.

What he said was, “Some people say the special delegates’ congress is not representative; party leaders, constituency chairmen, Members of Parliament, regional executives, can vote one-way and you say it’s not representative. If they are not representative, who are representative in the party.”

He therefore sought to draw a comparison between the number of delegates (740) who voted in the NPP congress to the 275 Members of Parliament (MPs) who represent the 25 million Ghanaians in Parliament saying, “275 people can meet somewhere to represent 25 million in Ghana’s Parliament…and you say 740 representing 140,000 is nothing?”

It thus beats the imagination of the office of Nana Akufo-Addo why the Daily Post newspaper would skew the report by misquoting him, if not for vile and vicious propaganda purposes, describing it as falsehood.

In spite of that, Nana Akufo-Addo expressed optimism that God would once again speak, come October 18, when the NPP votes to elect a flagbearer to lead the party to the 2016 general elections.

He seized the opportunity to deny reports that he approached some of his contenders to ask them to step down from the race for him since in his own words, “I am a firm believer in competition and I’ve always been and I’m ready for 18th October.”