Cancer report 'senseless' – NPP

The recent report by Africa Watch magazine that the flag bearer of the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP), Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has been battling prostate cancer, acute kidney injury and an enlarged heart since 2013 is laughable because no human being with all these health problems can be walking and travelling across the length and breadth of Ghana to campaign as the NPP leader is doing at the moment, Nana Akomea, Director of Communications for the party has said.

Reacting to the report on Inside Politics on Class91.3FM on Monday August 29, Mr Akomea wondered how “… A 72-year-old man who has an enlarged heart, and who has acute kidney injury, and who has cancer of the prostate” was neither undergoing dialysis nor using a heart pacer, but rather doing vigorous campaigning. “… As we speak, he [Nana Akufo-Addo] is holding rallies in the Upper East Region. Does it make sense?"

He added: “Even …those of us who are probably 20 years younger than Nana Addo, if we had acute kidney injury, and we had prostate cancer, I don’t think we will be travelling to the Upper East Region and campaigning from morning to night; not even in our constituencies.”

"Recently they (Africa Watch) published that former President Rawlings had Parkinson’s disease, today they said Nana Addo has cancer; that he has acute kidney injury and he has an enlarged heart. Speak to any doctor [about whether] … a patient … on the verge of kidney failure and his heart is so weak and has become so big and also has cancer … will be able to do one-tenth of the things that Nana Akufo-Adddo is doing. I don’t understand it."

Meanwhile, Mr Akufo-Addo, while speaking to the Bolgatanga Traditional Council in the Upper East Region on Sunday, August 28 during his campaign, fought the claim.

He said: “First, they said I was a drug addict; it didn’t work. They said I was sick; it didn’t work. They said I was too old; it didn’t work. They said I was a hunchback; it didn’t work. They said I was a dwarf; it didn’t work. They said I was in a wheelchair; it didn’t work. They said I am a murderer; it didn’t work. They said I would die in June; it didn’t work. They said I was a dictator; it didn’t work. They said I was intolerant; it didn’t work. They said I was violent; it didn’t work. They said I had a secret agenda to destabilise the country; it didn’t work. Now, they say I have cancer, it will not work.”