NDC Congress in danger

All is not well with the main opposition, National Democratic Congress (NDC) party. Credible information reveals that some leading figures in the pro-Rawlings faction of the party have initiated moves to scuttle the party’s scheduled December 28 National Congress, the Chronicle, a private newspaper reports.

The group is seeking to have the congress rescheduled over fears that the former Minister of Justice and Attorney General, Dr. Obed Asamoah, currently the lead candidate for the national Chairmanship slot, will walk home with the prize position, if the event is not postponed. The next NDC chairman will serve as leader, should the party’s founder (Rawlings) lose that title at the forthcoming congress.

The paper suggests that the reason being put across by the pro-Rawlings group for rescheduling the congress include the explanation that the date of the event will coincide with the date for the reburial of the executed Army generals, which incidentally falls on the same date.

There were strong indications by press time that the ruling New Patriotic Party government was considering fixing the date for the reburial of the late army officers earlier than December 28.

Another argument put forward by the now-jittery pro-Rawlings faction is that the date is inappropriate, since it was on the same date that former Vice President John Atta Mills lost the presidential run-off election to President J. A. Kufuor. No decision had been taken on whether to postpone the date as at press time Chronicle reports say.

“Attempts to talk to the party’s General Secretary, Alhaji Huudu Yahaya believes to have been slated for the position of Vice-Chairman by the pro-Rawlings camp, on Tuesday and Wednesday failed.”

Media Committee Chairman Ekow Spio-Garbrah had left the office to the Airport to board a flight to South Africa by the time Chronicle called Tuesday morning. None of the executive had responded to phone messages left at the party office by press time. NDC’s National Youth Organiser, E.T. Mensah MP, said h e was not aware of any move to have the party’s congress postponed, since no such issue has been brought to his notice. “But the Chronicle gathered from reliable sources that the effort to convince the party hierarchy to reschedule the impending congress was real.”

Sources say the fear of an Obed Asamoah victory became more manifested over the weekend when the Eastern Volta and Greater Accra Regions elected what the paper called “pro-Obed” candidates at their regional delegates’ congress.

The Eastern Region elected former minister for mines and energy, Fred Ohene Kena (he was sacked by the former president and he publicly challenged that decision) as chairman, while the same position in the Volta Region went to the MP for Ketu North and former Volta Regional minister, Modestus Ahiable.

The rise of former Greater Accra regional minister and former MP for Krowor, Joshua Alabi, to the chairmanship of the party was the third heartache for the pro-Rawlings group. According to the Chronicle, Alabi was nearly sacked by Rawlings as a minister, and Rawlings’s aide, Victor Smith was reported as having told an Accra radio station that the former president even advised against the retention of Alabi as the NDC Parliamentary candidate for Krowor at the 2000 elections.

All three newly-elected chairmen are reported to be close friends of Obed Asamoah, “who acknowledged this in an interview yesterday but suggested further that the three are independent-minded men who are equally on good terms with the former president and founder and leader of the party.

Rawlings’s aide also accused Obed and Alabi of using their positions as members of the Re-organisation Committee of the party to win over the leadership positions in the NDC.

According to the Chronicle, some pro-Obed members of the party have vowed to break away from the NDC if Rawlings and his faction would not allow real democracy in the party.