Esseku: 'NPP not divided, Nana will win 2016'

Anybody who thinks Ghana's biggest opposition party is divided is "dreaming," a former chairman of the New Patriotic Party has told host of Class91.3fm’s Executive Breakfast Show, Ekow Mensah-Shalders on Tuesday November 24.

"NPP is not divided," Mr Esseku asserted, despite a raging rumpus in the party over the indefinite suspension of national chairman Paul Afoko.

"Anybody who talks like that is dreaming. Our situation is far better than the [governing National Democratic Congress], NDC," he added.

According to him, the NPP and its flagbearer Nana Akufo-Addo will win next year’s general elections despite the furore over Mr Afoko’s suspension. "I don’t see any infighting," he said, adding: “…Oh yes we are winning!"

Mr Esseku also said Mr Afoko was suspended from the party because he was misbehaving.

According to 81-year-old Mr Esseku, who was also suspended as chairman of the party in the past, Mr Afoko disobeyed the elders in the party and also committed certain “errors” which led the NPP to suspend him.

The party’s National Executive Committee and National Council upheld a recommendation by the Disciplinary Committee to suspend Mr Afoko almost two months ago.

His suspension has worsened divisions within the party. It led to the murder of a party member in Asawase a few weeks ago when pro-Afoko party members clashed with supporters of flagbearer Nana Akufo-Addo.

Though suspended, Mr Afoko maintains he is still the legitimate chairman and has challenged the processes used to suspend him, describing them as illegal. He recently expressed his intentions to take the matter to court.