Crabbe: 'I’ll fight any 'Afoko-style' action against me'

The Second Vice-Chairman of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Sammy Crabbe has said he will still hold himself as a Deputy Chairman of the NPP, if the Party sidelines constitutional procedures in its quest to suspend or remove him, just as, in his view, the National Executive Committee (NEC) did to National Chairman Paul Afoko.

“If somebody comes there and complains and [due] process is not followed, I shall still hold myself as National Vice-Chairman,” Mr Crabbe told Kwadwo Asare-Bafour Acheampong on Asempa FM’s Ekosii political talk programme on Thursday.

Sammy Crabbe has come under fire for opposing the suspension of Mr Afoko. He has disregarded Freddie Blay as acting chairman and vowed not to contest for any national position if the decision is allowed to hold.

Mr Crabbe said there is no provision in the NPP constitution, which recognises Mr. Blay as acting chairman. He has been very vocal about the decision and even labelled a meeting convened by the Party on Thursday at the Asylum Headquarters in Accra as a “group of friends who have come together”.

Meanwhile, the NPP’s Director of Communication, Nana Akomea, has said any petition brought against Mr Crabbe for disciplinary action to be taken against him will receive rapt attention of the leadership.

That is the fallout from Mr Crabbe’s opposition to Mr Blay’s authority as acting Chairman.

Mr Blay, first Vice-Chair, assumed the acting position following the unanimous upholding, by the National Executive Committee (NEC), of the Disciplinary Committee’s recommendation to suspend Mr Afoko for allegedly working against the interest of the NPP and Flagbearer Nana Akufo-Addo.

Mr Crabbe, who has always been perceived as a pro-Afoko, pro-Kufuor person, told Joy FM in an interview Wednesday that recognising Mr Blay’s leadership will be tantamount to supporting a coup d’état.

His comments have attracted the attention of the Party, and Mr Akomea has expressed surprise at his remarks.

“He [Crabbe] says he won’t recognise the decision of NEC and he is supposed to be second Vice-Chair. He may disagree, but once that is a decision by a NEC, he has to follow.

“I would have expected him to follow the laid-down procedures of the Party in expressing his grievances because even Paul Afoko himself is following the structures of the party,” Mr Akomea noted.

He added: “Now if anybody brought a petition against him on that basis, I am sure it will be given serious attention. He is definitely setting himself up for disciplinary measures of the party.”