Wereko Brobbey Under Severe Attack

A founding member of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Dr. Charles Wereko-Brobby, has become a punching bag for asking the party to forgo its intended legal battle, “lick” its wounds and prepare for “a better performance in 2016 and beyond.”

Kwabena Agyapong, Nana Akomea, Sammi Awuku and PC Appiah-Ofori have on various media platforms heavily bashed the ex-Volta River Authority (VRA) boss on his views that the NPP was complicit in its own defeat at the just ended general Elections.

Twenty eight-year-old Sammi Awuku, a possible grandchild to Dr. Wereko-Brobby, said the argument advanced by the ex-VRA boss was faulty, adding “NPP had millions of votes, so Dr. Wereko-Brobbey’s opinion cannot negate the millions of people who have also expressed their opinion for us to proceed to the law court.”

“If the party had been vigilant, I have no doubt that we would have won,” Dr. Wereko-Brobby, who is known for speaking his mind said while casting doubts on the party’s chances of reversing the 2012 election verdict at the law courts.

Dr. Wereko-Brobby said the NPP would just be throwing dust into the eyes of its supporters if they kept on harping on the likely positive outcome of its intended court case.

He was of the firm belief that had the NPP channeled as much energy into protecting the ballot box as the party appears to be doing with the compilation of voting irregularities across the country, the results declared by the Electoral Commission (EC) would have been different.

Known in political circles as ‘Tarzan’, the former VRA boss, minced no words in telling Kwami Sefa Kayi, host of Peace FM’s morning show ‘Kokrokoo’ that the NPP put up an abominable performance in its monitoring and policing of ballot day events, especially the counting of the votes.

He accused the NPP of being overly confident of its chances and completely ignoring and writing off all of the “manipulative machinations” of the EC in the run-up to the elections, especially the EC’s “damning failures” on the verification of the electoral register.

According to him, Ghanaians wanted and voted for an NPP administration but were let down following the failure to secure victory through effective policing of the count.

To him, the failure is unpardonable and no amount of post-facto noise and bravado will atone for the cardinal sins of the NPP leadership.

“This is a difficult time; people are going to celebrate Christmas and up till now, they still don’t know the fate…As for me, I doubt if this court case will amount to anything. We should stop giving false hopes because if we had any substantial evidence, we would have publicized it… We should not do anything that will tarnish the image of the country…let’s not rouse people’s expectation or anger. We need to think ahead and work hard towards 2016…” he said.

However, another NPP stalwart sharply disagreed.

Kwabena Agyei Agyapong, former Press Secretary to former President John Agyekum Kufuor, speaking on the same platform, said the former VRA Chief Executive jumped the gun.

He opined that even if Dr. Wereko-Brobby had issues with the action taken by the party, he (Wereko-Brobby) should have waited for the outcome of the investigations and the court action before making ‘such a comment’.

“…you cannot just get up and say that we should let it go, we would be setting a bad precedent…we are not only just fighting for one person or the NPP to be declared the winner, but we are also seeking to have reforms in our electoral system…Even if it is going to take us our last sweat or last pint of blood, we have to make sure the right thing is done. And so I am very surprised that Wereko-Brobby would make a statement that the party did not do its work well; someone who professes to be a member of our party?…he rushed in making such a comment…all we need is for the right thing to be done,” Kwabena Agyapong said.

The NPP Director of Communications, Nana Akomea expressed bafflement at Dr Wereko-Brobbey’s comments, that the party lost the 2012 elections because it failed to protect the ballot and questioned the basis for Tarzan’s comments.

Nana Akomea described the election’s outcome with an analogy, saying that just because a security man failed in his duties to protect a house does not mean that the burglar should be rewarded and praised for his action.

He said given the “extensive irregularity” that characterised the 2012 elections, it would be foolhardy on the part of the NPP to let sleeping dogs lie.

Nana Akomea said the NPP owed it to Ghana and her young democracy to challenge the election results at the courts.

“We have a duty to expose these irregularities so they don’t happen again,” he added, while having a banter with Dr. Wereko-Brobby on Joy FM, last Monday.

He dismissed the assertions by Dr. Wereko-Brobby that the NPP was complicit in its own election defeat, insisting that the incontrovertible evidence of fraud gathered so far necessitated the legal challenge the NPP plans to mount against the results.

He insisted that the party would follow the due process of law and will present its case to the Supreme Court within 21 days of the declaration of results as stipulated by law.

The Member of Parliament (MP) for Asikuma-Odobeng- Brakwa, questioned the intellectual ability of Dr. Wereko-Brobby who had attributed NPP’s electoral defeat to complacency.

Paul Collins Appiah-Ofori said Dr. Wereko-Brobby’s inability to decipher right from wrong in the just ended general elections is an attestation that his “level of intelligence is very low”.

Speaking on Asempa FM’s Ekosii Sen programme, last Monday, the parliamentarian described as unfortunate the position taken by Tarzan, adding that his [Wereko-Brobbey] argument lacks logical reasoning.

According to him, no true NPP member will allow the will of the people to be subverted by some unscrupulous EC officials whom he says are only concerned about their well-being.

“Wereko-Brobby must go back to school because I don’t expect someone like him with a doctorate degree to speak like this; I am very surprised” he opined.

The Asikuma-Odobeng-Brakwa MP indicated that the decision by the NPP to go to court is enshrined in Article 64 Clause 1 of the 1992 Constitution and thus the party had not flouted any law.

He added that just because some NPP polling agents failed to do due diligence and signed what he called the fraudulent pink sheets of the EC did not mean the party had no case. Appiah Ofori stressed that the party’s legal team would within 21 days present its case in court to ensure that the will of Ghanaians is manifested. The youngest of the attackers is Sammi Awuku.

He told Citi FM that Dr. Wereko-Brobby’s position on the court case, were flawed.

Mr. Awuku said “he has expressed his opinion, we sharply disagree and we disagree on very strong principles.”

“Dr. himself agrees that the process was flawed; however he thinks that we should not take the matter up because it’s not going to get anywhere.”

According to Mr. Awuku for the NPP “this is also for the sustenance, maintenance and the survival of our fledgling democracy; where it becomes a battle for the strongest and who has the power to buy the system. So once Doc (Dr. Wereko-Brobbey) agrees that the process was flawed, I think it is the basis for us to continue from there.”

“We believe that at the end of the day, it is the court that is going to decide if we [NPP] have a case or not. For us in the NPP we believe that this is the best thing to do at this point in time, the evidence that we have is overwhelming.

“NPP had millions of votes, so Dr. Wereko-Brobbey’s opinion cannot negate the millions of people who have also expressed their opinion for us to proceed to the law court.”