Rawlings: NDC is bound to lose 2016 elections

Former President Jerry John Rawlings is emphatic the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) is heading for doom in the 2016 general elections.

He said as it stands now, the John Mahama-led administration is no longer attractive to Ghanaians because government and party officials have “compromised their integrity.”

Rawlings, who ruled Ghana for close to two decades, called on party delegates to vote out corrupt party executives come the national congress to cleanse the party.

“It appears some of them have compromised themselves,” the former military ruler told Accra-based Citi FM Thursday. “If we bring on board people who have not compromised themselves, people who have not allowed themselves to be corrupted by money... we could be doing better than what is going on.”

He declared: “This is certainly not going to earn us political office in 2016 and at this stage we are bound to lose, just as we were bound to lose when President Mills was in office. Fortunately, God took him away and gave us a new hope to this party.

"...We appear to have lost a large measure of integrity and should we regain it, will help improve our chances in the next elections and improve the quality of democracy of our party and stability of the nation.”

Rawlings has therefore called for the expansion of the electoral college of the NDC just as the main opposition New Patriotic Party. He said the move has transformed the Danquah-Busia-Dombo Tradition, making their “democratic base stronger” and “it is something we can do.”

According to Rawlings, it is very difficult to buy an expanded electoral college and that will therefore ensure the election of people with integrity to lead the party ahead of the next general polls.