NPP MP Threatens to Go Independent

THE NEW Patriotic Party (NPP) Member of Parliament (MP) for Birim North, Dr. William Boakye Akoto, has stated that by hook or crook, he would run as an independent parliamentary candidate in the constituency in the forthcoming general election.

This decision he said, stemmed from the fact that his teeming supporters thought that he had been treated unfairly by the regional and national executives of the NPP.

Mr. Boakye Akoto said this in an interview with The Chronicle at Parliament House last week on whether he still intended to run as an independent parliamentary candidate after losing in the primary.

He said the decision of the party to sack any member who goes independent after losing the primaries was just like a scarecrow, adding that he would work with the NPP caucus when he won in the parliamentary election.

"I will never quit NPP," he stressed.

The incumbent MP explained that his opponent, in the constituency primary, Esther Obeng Dapaah, did not come from the constituency and also did not meet the requirements for contesting as an MP, especially the part of the constitution which stipulates that a person should have lived in the area for at least the last five years.

The woman, he said, had lived in the UK for the past 34 years and anytime she was in the country, she lived in a town located in the Kade constituency.

"According to my party's constitution, if you want to stand as an MP, you have to be an active member for the party for at least two years."

As to why he boycotted the primary, the MP said he had managed to get 20 of the polling station chairmen on his side who shared his views and knew how far he had brought the constituency during his term of office as MP.

He recalled that before the filing of nominations for the primary, the party, as a policy, asked that no candidate should go round and portray himself or herself as a potential candidate when there was a sitting MP but the aspiring MP defied this.

Mr. Akoto said later on, he petitioned the regional and national executives of the party but it fell on deaf ears and this made him realise that they were all in support of what was going on in the constituency.

"My supporters saw that the playing ground was not level hence my boycott."

He mentioned that the people wanted him to continue with the good works he was doing for them, which included the construction of a road from Nkwakwa to New Birim.

He said as well that he had managed to get the only secondary school in the area to be upgraded as part of the president's initiative to upgrade at least one school in every district, to supply roofing sheets to every community and made sure that each community benefitted from his share of the district assemblies' common fund.

He said he had given every soccer team in the constituency jerseys and football accessories, a water closet toilet totalling over ?150 million and five dual desks to deprived schools.

Dr. Boakye Akoto was one of the sitting MPs who threatened to contest as an independent candidate after boycotting the primary even though the party said it was against its constitution.