'Green book' and huge billboards cost NDC 2016 elections – Kunbuor

Former Minister of Defence Dr. Benjamin Kunbuor, has blamed the unprecedented defeat of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) in the 2016 elections on the party’s ‘Green book' and huge billboards.

He said, while the major political opponent of the NDC, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) was busily winning the electorates over with their juicy policies including free Senior High School (SHS), restoration of the teacher and nursing trainee allowances, the NDC was wallowing in corruption and greed.

According to the member of the Cadres Association of the opposition NDC who was having a discussion with Nana Aba Anamoah on GhOne’s State of Affairs show, the message of the NDC did not reach the citizens well because priorities were misplaced.

Giving account of an incident that happened during the campaign of the party, he said the NDC could not communicate the achievements of its government well enough.

“I happened to be in the Volta Region… The Kumasi central market in terms of its completion was put in the center of Ho to showcase the achievements of the government meanwhile the Ho market was at its foundation,” he lamented.

He said such errors committed by the party could have angered and embittered grassroot members of the party, who have not had the opportunity to enjoy same developments.

“The question that one would ask is did you want to get voters from the Volta Region or you wanted attract people from the Ashanti Region who were in the Volta Region that their market was completed?’ he quizzed.

The NDC as part of its campaign strategy introduced a Green book which contain all the achievements the party has chalked since it took over power from the (NPP) in 2009.

The party also erected “huge” billboards on streets of cities across the country to project its achievements to the electorate.

He also mentioned the timing of the IMF package as an example of the external factor which could not be well managed by the party eventually leading to their defeat.

He blamed the high graduate unemployment in the country for the party’s current position.

“There is no way that with the global unemployment particularly youth unemployment we have in this country that it will not become an election issue. In the peculiar state of Ghana I saw the percentage of unemployment reach an astronomical level to the extent that an association of unemployed graduates has to be formed to articulate this concerns,” he stressed