The Member of Parliament-Elect for Ablekuma West, Rev Kweku Addo, has told the story behind his decision to venture into politics, which is regarded ‘as a dirty profession,’ despite being a pastor.
Speaking in an interview on Metro TV’s Good Morning Ghana on Tuesday, December 17, 2024, Rev Addo indicated that he had no plans of being a politician, let alone running for a political office.
He said he, however, joined the NDC due to the influence of his friend, Humphrey Mensah, the son of the late Ghanaian statesman, ET Mensah.
He said that while he was in the US working, Humphrey Mensah, who is now late, kept pestering him to join the NDC.
The MP-elect said that when he returned to Ghana for a break, he decided to attend a meeting of the NDC after the late Mensah’s invitation at Dansoman, a community in the Ablekuma West Constituency.
After attending a number of meetings of the party, he said he gained some interest in joining the party, following which he read their constitution.
Humphrey Mensah then began to encourage him to run for the constituency as its MP, and together with some of the party executives, they managed to convince him to finally agree, he added.
“After reading through the NDC constitution, I saw it is not a bad group. A friend of mine, whilst I was in the US, there was one guy, Humphrey Mensah, ET Mensah’s son… invited me to a couple of their meetings. So, I visited some of their meetings about twice in D.C.
“So, when I came, then he came around and he said, ‘Oh, Charlie, you can do this’. And then the NDC in the neighbourhood, a few of them contacted me in 2018, and said ‘The way you are doing things, I think you can be of help to us’. And so, that was when I read the constitution and I thought it was very simple enough, very humane,” he narrated.
Rev Addo added, “So, then primaries came, 2019, I stood and luckily, I won - first time. So, I stood with one gentleman, PDA. After I won, now whether you like it or not, you’re on the track.”
He said that after losing the 2020 parliamentary election, he did not give up and the lessons he learnt from that election are what made him win the 2024 polls.
“So, we went into the 2020. With the 2020 election, now looking back, I didn’t know anything… after 2020, one got a better understanding of what one had gotten himself into. So, then, now you really have to put work into it. And that’s what has brought us here,” he added.
Watch his comments in the video below:
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