MP threatens resignation

Former Kumasi Mayor and current New Patriotic Party Member of Parliament for Asokwa in Kumasi, Maxwell Kofi Jumah, has threatened to quit his seat if certain NPP executives of the constituency are not shown the door.

He wants the Ashanti Regional office of the NPP, and indeed the national hierarchy, to dismiss three polling station executives from the party over what he said are acts of indiscipline - including campaigning for the then opposition NDC and an independent candidate during the 2008 Elections instead of for the NPP.

According to Kumasi-based Nyhira FM’s Ohemeng Tawiah, Mr. Jumah has not been on the best of terms with the constituency polling station executives of the party for some months now.

The MP’s differences with the party executives degenerated late last year when Mr. Jumah locked them out of the constituency office over claims they failed to obtain permission for its use.

The executives, who passed a vote of no confidence in the constituency chairman, retaliated by locking the place up with their own set of locks and followed it up with a complaint to the police at Asokwa alleging the MP had threatened to ‘kill’ or ‘deal’ with them.

But Mr. Jumah said he has evidence the group campaigned for the NDC and an independent candidate in the 2008 elections and for which they must be booted out of the party or he would show himself the door.

“I don’t want the matter to be settled amicably. I’m writing to the party; constituency, the region and the national to take disciplinary action against those three people. I have other charges against them anyway. They didn’t take part in our campaign for 2008, they campaigned for the NDC and they campaigned for an independent candidate. My party constitution does not allow that. They should be dismissed from the party and I will put my MP on the line …Should the party fail to do that I will resign as a Member of Parliament. I’m serious. If they don’t take disciplinary action against them, I will resign, as simple as that.”

One of the accused executives, Osei Effah Amponsah, has rebuffed Mr. Jumah’s claims and dared him to provide proof that he and his colleagues worked for the NDC and an independent candidate or he would drag him to court.

“He should resign because you know, he needs to go. I don’t deserve to leave the party because I love the party and we haven’t worked contrary to the constitution of the party and we were polling agents in the first round and even the second round so what is he talking about?...We are not going to wait for just a single win to destroy the party. If he is telling us we were campaigning for NDC, I’m throwing a challenge; he should come and prove, if he is not able to prove, then I will also call him in court.”

Meanwhile Mr. Ofori Agyapong, Asokwa NPP constituency secretary, said no official complaints were lodged with the party over the allegations that the three accused persons worked against the NPP or Mr. Kofi Jumah.