NPP Kwesimintim primary: Man arrested for allegedly bribing delegates

A member of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) at the Kwesimintim constituency in the Western Region, only known as Lucas was on Tuesday morning arrested during the ongoing constituency primary for allegedly bribing delegates.

The accused who is aligned to Joseph Mensah one of candidates had positioned himself at an obscure place behind the polling centre, was caught in the act dolling out envelopes containing money to some of the delegates.

Kasapa FM’s Western Regional Correspondent, Ohene Gyan who’s covering the primary reported that one of the delegates spotted the conduct of Lucas and raised alarm leading to him being accosted by delegates mainly aligned to the incumbent Member of Parliament who is also a contesting in the election.

“He had pitched camp behind the polling centre where he was said to be dolling out the monies, a woman saw what he was doing and started shouting, the police arrested him with about 15 envelopes containing cash.” Ohene Gyan noted.

He added that it took the intervention of the police officers assigned to the poll to bring the rowdy situation under control.

The NPP Kwesimintsim constituency primary is the last to be conducted by the party, has been suspended since 2015, due to some disagreement that rocked the contest between incumbent Joe Badoe Ansah and opponent Joseph Mensah.

An Accra High Court last Friday September 23, directed the NPP to take steps to conduct the Primary after the court cleared Mr Joseph Mensah, a as qualified to contest that election.

Last year (2015) an injunction was placed on the Kwesimintim constituency election which is the NPP’s only yet to held poll, following Mr Mensah’s disqualification from the contest.

Mr. Joseph Mensah, aka Joe Mensah and the sitting Member of Parliament (MP) for the constituency, Joe Baidoe Ansah, filed their nominations to contest the primary, which was expected to have taken place on Saturday June 13, 2015.

But, before the election could even come on, the NPP announced the disqualification of Joe Mensah, which prompted him to go to court to seek a redress.

The party had claimed that it did not know Mr Mensah and that he had forged a membership card to enable him contest the election, a claim that the latter outrightly rejected insisting he has been an NPP member since 2003.

Kasapa FM’s Court Correspondent, Daakyehene Ofosu Agyeman reported that the Presiding Judge, Rosseta Bernasko Essah in her ruling said upon looking at the facts presented before her, she found no basis to disqualify Mr Mensah.

She thus asked the party to go ahead to hold the election to enable the NPP get a candidate to contest in the upcoming December 7 Parliamentary election.