NPP claimed electoral victory when witches, robbers were at work - Anyidoho

Deputy General Secretary of the National Democratic Congress, Koku Anyidoho, has explained the nocturnal dealings of the New Patriotic Party on the night of the December 7, 2017 elections, forced him to make the famous comfortable lead statement.

Ahead of the release of official results by the Electoral Commission, the NDC held a news conference at the early hours of December 8, 2016 at which Mr. Anyidoho declared: “President Mahama is in a comfortable lead as far as the presidential vote is concerned”.

His statement, which was widely criticized, turned out to be false as official results released later by the EC put New Patriotic Party’s Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo at 53.85 per cent of the total valid votes cast as against John Mahama’s 44.4 per cent.

On the first anniversary of the election, Mr. Anyidoho has come out to explain the rationale behind the controversial statement which has since become a social media sensation among Ghanaians.

“By 1:00 am [Dec. 8, 2016], the time that armed robbers and witches operate, the NPP was holding a press conference claiming they had won the election. We didn’t know which witch or which armed robber had gone to rob the election results for them,” he jokingly said.

He indicated that the NDC found the declarations by the NPP unacceptable because their action was against the electoral laws of Ghana which prohibits declaration of results.

Mr. Anyidoho said as the man commanding the NDC troops for the election, the NPP’s statement that Nana Akufo-Addo was winning the election forced him to intervene by assuring the NDC soldiers.

“I was the commander of the forces and I was at the forefront of the battle, so I had to assure my people that we are not down yet based on the numbers we had gotten with regards to the presidential votes,” he said.

He said it was in doing so that he made the statement that John Mahama was in a comfortable lead in the presidential election. Meanwhile, he has said the NDC is on course with its restructuring programme and will bounce back stronger.