NPP is a Tribal Party- Dede Djaba

…Calls on Akufo-Addo to Retire

The widely held perception that the New Patriotic Party is an Akan elitist party and elements within it have grave abhorrence to people of different ethnic extractions could not have been a misplaced thought after all, as a leading member of the New Patriotic and a Peace Ambassador, Goergette Dede Djaba has confirmed it.

Ms Goergette Dede Djaba, who is a sister of the NPP’s Women’s Organizer, Otiko Afiso Djaba blames the party’s failure to wrestle power from the National Democratic Congress in the just ended election on people she describes as “elitist Akan technocrats who have hijacked the party”

Speaking on Adom fm’s Dwaso Nsem Monday, hosted by Kofi Adomah Nwanwanii, the loud mouth Peace Ambassador explained that the NPP would be fighting over spilt milk if they proceed to court to challenge the electoral results announced by the Electoral Commission.

According to her such a move will not only jeopardize the fortunes of the party but will portray it as a political organization that has the tendency of fighting every electoral result when it does not go in its favor.

“There was too much cooks for the campaign…Some of them was complacent, others instead of concentrating on the campaign, they were busily jostling for position when we’ve not even won the election. We presented 70 pages manifesto that was so convoluted and centered only on Free SHS”

She noted that going into an election is just like the game of football “you have to psych yourself for a win or lose…but the leadership of my party were only aiming for a win when in actual fact they have not worked for it…how can you be aiming for a victory in an election when you have marginalized the contribution of other tribes.”

Ms Djaba noted that whoever informed Nana Akufo-Addo to challenge the results at the court, ill-advised him and what the party ought to have done was to go for arbitration where they would be given the opportunity to bargain.

“As at now, we don’t know exactly what the party leadership wants to achieve with their current posturing. Let even assume for a moment that the court rule in favor of Akufo-Addo, it would be practically impossible for him to govern because the NDC has majority in parliament” she bolted

According to her for the party to make any meaningful political in roads in future, Nana Akufo-Addo must retire and pave way for non Akans, preferably a ‘Dombo’ (Northerner) to lead the party. “Akufo-Addo has made a mark on the political scene in Ghana he should take a peaceful bow, probably he should write a book on his political life”

Political pundits have noted that the current development in the NPP brings to light the power struggle between the Ashanti/Akyem power blocs in the party.

“It appears loyalists of Alan Kyeremanten are not in favor of the court action and those loyal to Akufo-Addo are vehemently pushing for the court action” a political pundit noted

The political sounded brain predicted that “in the coming days there will be leading members of the NPP coming out to state their position either for the court action or against the court action…their position will be motivated by which faction they belong to…the Ashanti bloc wants to save the image of the party for Alan in 2016 and that is a fact”.

Already, a leading member of the NPP, Dr Charles Wereko-Brobby in a statement issued in Accra, cast doubts on the party’s chances of reversing the 2012 election verdict at the court.

Whilst he believes there is a substantial case of “official manipulation and massaging of both the voting process and the outcome of election 2012,” he noted that the party and its polling agents were “complicit” in what he says is another stolen verdict in the country’s election.

He said if the party had channeled all its energies into protecting the ballot as it is now doing in compiling voting irregularities across the country to go to court, the results declared by the Electoral Commission would have been different.

Rather than going to court, Dr Wereko-Brobby says the party leaders must “let sleeping dogs lie” so that they “prepare to put up a better performance in 2016 and beyond.”

Another NPP stalwart and former Member of Parliament for Kwadaso in Kumasi Ashanti region, Josephine Hilda Addo has also kicked against the party going to court over the election dispute.

Madam Hilda Addo further condemned the surfacing of Alan Kyeremanten’s posters in the Ashanti regional capital and blamed it on intra party rivalry to discredit the former Trade and Industry minister under the Kufuor administration.