Consensus building crucial in the selection of candidates - Odeneho Appiah

Odeneho Kwaku Appiah, Afigya-Kwabre South Constituency Chairman of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) has stressed the need for consensus building among Party executives and opinion leaders in the constituencies in the selection and approval of parliamentary candidates for the Party.

He said there should also be an elaborate and workable succession plan for leadership positions at all levels of the Party in the constituencies to help reduce acrimony and internal wrangling in the Party, especially during parliamentary primaries.

Speaking in an interview with the Ghana News Agency at Kodie, Odeneho Appiah said it was time a comprehensive platform was created at the constituency levels for discussions and diplomacy in dealing with issues, such as the selection of parliamentary candidates for the Party.

He stated emphatically that, it was not right for anybody who claimed to be a Party member to only come to the Constituency office when there was going to be an elections, to pick a form to contest for positions and afterwards, vanish from Party activities in the constituencies.

Odeneho Kwaku Appiah, explained that constituency executives needed to identify Party leaders at all levels, train, nurture and build their capacities to take up appointments in the future.

He suggested that elections should be the last resort in the selections of leaders, especially, parliamentary candidates in the constituencies.

Odeneho Kwaku Appiah, pointed out that some people have turned themselves into what he called “parliamentary aspirants agents”, who collected huge sums of money from people in a bid to push them to stand as parliamentary candidates.

He warned the electoral area coordinators, branch executives and other leaders of the Party in the constituencies to be warry of such people, who tried to create confusion and divisions among Party members.

Odeneho Kwaku Appiah said some aspirants just come and pick forms and when they lose the primaries that would be the end.

“They will not set foot to the constituency party office again, until the next election period,” he stated.

He said loyalty, hard work and dedication to the course of the Party should be the guiding principle in the selection of people to contest for positions in the Party.

The Chairman said the parliamentary primaries should not be allowed as a fertile ground for divisions and disunity in the Party in the constituencies, adding that, it should not be allowed to create a loophole for opponents to infiltrate in their ranks.