Ghana has a de facto 2-party system - Dr Seidu Alidu

Senior Lecturer and Political scientist at the University of Ghana, has revealed that Ghana's political landscape is one characterised by a de facto two-party system.

Speaking at a workshop held by the Media for West Africa (MFWA), Dr Seidu Alidu noted that although there are multiple political parties in the country, only two have, per the pattern over the years, ganered up to 75 percent of the votes in the country's elections.

“If you have a system regardless of the political parties that are there and in every election, two political parties divide up to 75 percent of the votes and none of them is able to get up to 65% of the votes then you have a two-party system.

Since 1992, in every election if you add the total of the NDC and the NPP it adds up to more than 70 percent but none of them alone is able to get 65 percent....

So, the jury, Ghana is a multiparty state, but de facto Ghana is a two-party state," he said.

Ghana has so far had five presidents under the Fourth Republic (1993 - present) and all five were from both the NDC and NPP.

Three out of the five; Flt. Lt. Jerry John Rawlings, John Evans Atta Mills and John Dramani Mahama were all from the National Democratic Congress (NDC), and two; John Agyekum Kufuor and incumbent President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo both from the New Patriotic Party.

Though there have been other parties including the Convention Peoples Party (CPP), the Progressive Peoples Party (PPP), the All People’s Congress (APC), the People’s National Convention (PNC) among others, the pattern, since the inception of the Fourth Republic has been same. Elections have seen the two ‘biggest’ parties always taking the forefront.