Konadu Heads To Court

…To challenge the use of NDC Name

As the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) readied itself for the next line of action to be pursued by its failed and obviously peeved presidential aspirant and president of the 31st December Women’s Movement (31stDWM), Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings over the ownership of the party’s logo, another legal suit to challenge the very legitimacy of the party is stirring it in the face, The Al-Hajj can today confirm.


Signals picked up by this paper last week speak of how Nana Konadu, a former vice-chairperson of the NDC and wife of the party’s founder who has been at loggerheads with the party and its leader and sitting president, John Mills; in consultation with her lawyers are exploring the possibility of going to court to force the party to relinquish the name, National Democratic Congress (NDC).


Dependable sources close to the discussions reveal to The Al-Hajj how Nana Konadu and her cohorts intend using surrogates to go to court to have the NDC surrender the name, as per the 1992 Political Parties Law, citing the party’s merger with Dr. Obed Yao Asamoah’s Democratic Freedom Party (DFP).


According to our source close to the Rawlingses, the Nana Konadu group will be relying on the Political Parties Law, Act 2000 (574) section 19 that deals with Merger of Registered Political Parties. Section 19 of the Political Party Act 2000 (574) states; Where two or more registered political parties come together and merge as one party (a) the registration of each party existing immediately before the effective date of the merger shall lapse; and


(b) the new party shall require registration for the purposes of this Act. Nana Konadu, who media reports suggests together with her husband and former president, Jerry John Rawlings would be outdooring a new political party on the 33rd anniversary of the June 4th Revolution at Aflao, has been peeved since losing the flagbearship of the party for the December elections to president Mills and has vowed to ditch him and the party.

The two political soulmates according to the source are hell-bent on getting President Atta Mills and the NDC out of power in the impending election in December this year.


She was said to have told a recent meeting of her loyalists that with the merger of NDC and the DFP, both parties, legally, cease to exist, and a new name therefore has to be adopted for the new party, and she would ensure that the name NDC is wiped out the surface of this earth.


She was also said to have warned that, she would compel the party to go for another congress to elect new executives before they even think of choosing a new flabearer for the December polls.


As part of Nana Konadu’s efforts at weakening and dismembering the NDC, according to another source “madam wants to make sure that president Mills and the NDC, in this present form; do not remain in power even a day after 7th January 2013, hence what has been unfolding”. Suspended Deputy General Secretary of the NDC and spokesperson of the Rawlingses, Kofi Adams has already hinted the party would be committing an illegality if it co-opts any member of the now defunct DFP as executive members. According to him, that will contravene the NDC constitution.


Kofi Adams added that the founder, Jerry Rawlings was not in full knowledge of the union of the NDC and DFP.

“It was news to him (Rawlings) that this merger was on going. Members of the executive council of the NDC who approved it failed to inform Mr. Rawlings who is also the chairman of the party’s council,” he told Citi News.


Early this month lawyers for Nana Konadu Agyemang Rawlings wrote to the ruling National Democratic Congress executives claiming ownership of the party’s logo. Nana Konadu through her lawyers reminded them of what she said are infringement on the party’s logo which is their client’s intellectual property.


According to her lawyers, the NDC logo is the intellectual property of their client, Nana Konadu because she created it, adding that, the right steps will be taken to ensure that the logo is not misused by individuals or group of persons.