IN SPITE of the giant efforts by the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) to redeem its dented image in Dagbon and Northern Region as a whole ahead of the forthcoming general elections, the party’s fate still seems to be shaking as its own members have subjected it to a “collateral damage” in Yendi. Meanwhile, over 6000 active youth of the NPP yesterday resigned from the party with a launch of fierce attacks and accusations, exposing what they termed as the ‘incompetence and insensitivity’ of the ruling government.
Speaking at a press conference, which turned into a mammoth durbar in Yendi, the Chairman of the rebelling NPP youth, Mr. Arimiyaw Abdulai disclosed that their actions were based on the fact that the incumbent Government, which they belonged to, had awfully relegated and denied them of their share of infrastructural development and human resource development The youth, who claimed to have not yet decided as to which political party to join next, however, gave a seven-day ultimatum to President J.A. Kufuor, National and Regional Executives of the NPP to address their grievances. The Chairman told the press that the 6000 mentioned was the few of the youth who were able to make it to the durbar, adding, ‘the number is more than even nine or ten thousand but some of them are engaged with their work and farm activities’.
He hinted that the NPP Government out of dirty politics, had succeeded in abandoning some important projects embarked on by the previous NDC government in Yendi. Mr. Arimiyaw also accused the Government of its lackadaisical approach towards finding lasting solution to the Dagbon Crisis. ‘After burying Ya-Na and installed a new Regent, we, the people of Yendi and Dagbon at large were expecting the Government to go ahead to perform the final funeral rites of Naa Abdulai and Naa Yakubu to ensure absolute peace in Dagbon but for five good months now nothing has been done yet. It is clear that the Government is pretending that there is peace in Dagbon, but we can state clearly that there is nothing like peace here. If there is peace why then should the Government deploy Military and Police forces to this area?, the Chairman bemoaned.
They also lamented on the continued military brutalities being meted on them for the past four years of the Dagbon Crisis.
They however hinted that they would continue to boycott all functions by the NPP until they were well listened to by the Government.
All effort by The Chronicle to speak with the Yendi NPP Constituency Chairman proved unsuccessful as his mobile number was switched off even at the time of filing this report.
However, the Northern Regional Secretary of NPP, Mr. Clifford Braimah told the paper in a telephone interview that the behavior of the youth had a collateral damage on the party which the youth have mistakenly attacked and brought into the chieftaincy crisis in the area.
Mr. Clifford, who said he suspected some NDC influential members for engineering the whole actions of the youth, however, appealed to them (youth) to rightly direct the traditional aspect of their grievances to the Otumfour’s Committee of Eminent Chiefs who had been mandated to handle the Dagbon issue and the developmental aspects to the Government, whilst the party executives also move into serious actions to push their agenda forward.
He appealed to the Otumfour Committee to speed up their work to ensure lasting peace in Dagbon.
The NPP Regional Chief Scribe was optimistic that the need of the youth would be addressed with all seriousness since the NPP Government as he noted, was a development minded Government. Mr. Clifford was also sure of the NPP’s chances of maintaining the Yendi seat, come 2008.
Meanwhile, The Chronicle gathered from sources that some political party executives have began negotiations with the over 6000 NPP youth.
