CPP condemns attack on 2016 Flagbearer

The Convention Peoples Party (CPP) at the weekend condemned the unguarded attack on the personality of Mr Ivor Kobina Greenstreets, the Party’s Elections 2016 Presidential Nominee.

Professor Edmund N. Delle, CPP Chairman and Leader in an interview with the Ghana News Agency expressed shocked and total disappointment about the statement attributed to Mr Franklin Jantuah, a Member of Osagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah’s Cabinet.

“The CPP abhors any form of discrimination either based on social class, political affiliation, health status, religious affinity, ethnic background. It is against the spirit and letter of the 1992 Constitution.

“The CPP dissociates the leadership, the Party and the rank and file from the unfortunate statement of Mr Jantuah,” Prof Delle stated.

The last surviving member of the Kwame Nkrumah administration, Mr Jantuah was alleged to have made derogatory remarks about Mr Greenstreet mainly due to his disability.

Prof Delle said the Party was committed and pledged its total support for Mr Greenstreet in spite of the disability… “Mr Greenstreet who served two terms as the General Secretary of the Party has demonstrated his capacity and capability to withstand and overcome all obstacles.

“We believe that the CPP delegates who elected Mr Greenstreet at the Party’s December National Delegates Congress made the right choice, Mr Greenstreet is well prepared and psychologically ready to campaign across the country.

“The Party is solidly behind him to project the CPP agenda for victory, CPP alternative agenda for the Ghanaians to consider and elect the Party again to complete the unfinished agenda of Osagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah”.

Prof Delle noted that 59 years after Independence Ghanaians must acknowledge the critical role Persons with Disabilities can play in the nation’s social-economic development.

The CPP Chairman noted that building a sustainable, inclusive country for all requires the full engagement of people of all abilities; “we must work together to transform the country”.

The CPP Chairman noted that the Party will continue to champion the voices of persons with disabilities; “as we look ahead, we need to strengthen development policies and practices to ensure that accessibility is part of inclusive and sustainable development.

“This requires improving our knowledge of the challenges facing all persons with disabilities – including through more robust, disaggregated data - and ensuring that they are empowered to create and use opportunities.

“Together with persons with disabilities, we can move our nation forward by leaving no one behind”.

Prof Delle called on the electorate not to look at Mr Greenstreet based on his disability but his capabilities as a person.

Born to two Professors from the University of Ghana, Legon, Mr Greenstreet is the third of four children.

Mr Greenstreet is a lawyer as well as a writer and publisher and was called to the Ghana Bar and the English Bar (Inner Temple).

He contested as a CPP Parliamentary Candidate in 1996 but had to withdraw due to the Great Alliance between the Party and New Patriotic Party at that time.

In 2004, he again contested as a parliamentary candidate for the CPP in the Ayawaso West Wuogon Constituency and had 4,964 votes for the Party (prior to that election the vote for CPP in that constituency had never exceeded 500).

He was later elected as General Secretary in 2007 and again in 2011, being the only national officer to be re-elected for a second term.

Ivor also served on the Disability Council from 2007-2009.

He is married to the daughter of late former Vice President Kow Arkaah, who is also a Lawyer and they have three children, a son and two daughters.