Ghanaians to punish NPP in future elections

It is worthy to ask whether the New Patriotic Party can master the needed courage in future elections and audaciously go back and solicit for votes from the over four million people, whose votes three leading members of the party is praying the Supreme Court to annul?

What even makes the issue vastly mindboggling and a dazzling political drama to experience in future elections is that, the rank and file of the NPP, who have unfalteringly given their support to the election petition, have explicitly conceded that none of the million votes they are seeking to annul were invalid at the time they were cast.

The NPP, throughout the hearing of the over three months trial, has made it clear that their reason for calling for an annulment of such an amount of votes was hinged on statutorily and constitutional violations, omissions and irregularities.

The collateral damage the actions of the 1st petitioner, Nana Akufo-Addo, 2nd petitioner, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia and Jake Obetsebi Lamptey the 3rd petitioner will have in subsequent elections, many political watchers say will be far greater than what the party is painfully and inaudibly suffering from Victor Owusu’s “inward looking” comment to Voltaraians in 1979 and Dr. K. A. Busia’s xenophobic and vicious Aliens Compliance Order of November 18, 1969.

That hate and ill-intended comments by Mr. Victor Owusu, the then leader of the United Party in 1979 is said to be the main reason why the NPP has been performing poorly in elections in the Volta region, which hitherto was quite a safe haven for them.

Equally, many political pundits have also hinged the political price the NPP continue to pay in the three Northern regions, which used to be good grounds due to the exploits of UP elements like Chief Simon Diedong Dombo and others, on the party’s abhorrence and ill-treatment of people of northern extraction.

More so, it also is a well-established fact that, Dr. Busia’s Aliens Compliance Order of 1969, originally meant to repatriate some, mostly West African nationals, mainly Nigerians, Togolese, Burkinabes and Ivorians, heavily affected some Northerners in Ghana as a result of which indigenes vowed not to vote for the party.

Also, in carrying out the order, security officials under the Progress Party administration mistakenly added some Ghanaians from the Northern extraction to the foreigners whiles many of the Northern Ghanaians who were married to some of the foreigners were also affected.

The above epoch in the history of the country has continued to haunt the UP tradition and its offshoot, NPP, and as such, many believed the move by Nana Akufo-Addo and two others to have the votes of people, mainly from his opponent’s strongholds cancelled will spell doom for the party.

When The Al-Hajj sampled the views of people in the Greater Accra, Volta, and the three Northern regions on the matter, (calling for an annulment of their votes) most of them in a furious mood said they will definitely discipline the NPP in future polls.

“We stood in long queues on December 7 and 8 election to cast our votes; after voting, our votes were counted, our votes was neither declared spoilt ballots or rejected ballots; we see no reason why somebody would want to cancel our votes on the excuse that somebody didn’t do his work…so we are telling those who have initiated that move that we will be waiting for them in another election” some of the voters chanted.

According to some of them, whether the Supreme Court uphold the NPP’s argument to cancel their votes or not, they will slam their doors on them “if they come back to us and ask us to vote for them if they want my votes to be cancelled, why would they want my votes in future elections? An angry respondent remarked.