Desperation is driving the twice defeated and third-time flagbearer of the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP), Mr. Williams Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, to indulge in the habit of begging all manner of persons to make him president, as he is engaged in the fight of his life in his quest of fulfilling his childhood dream of becoming the President of Ghana at all cost.
This time, the wobbling NPP flagbearer has decided to push his ‘begging campaign’ a notch higher by frantically begging the flagbearers of the Convention People’s Party (CPP) and People’s National Convention (PNC) to pave the way for him to become President.
The NPP flagbearer was in the Western region over the weekend where he profusely begged congregants of some churches in the region to consider making him president, since he has been a round in the scheme of Ghana’s politics for a long time.
According to The Catalyst sources within the top echelons of the NPP, a resolution of the Akufo-Addo “cabinet” for the adaptation of an election strategy which is believed to have contributed huge benefits to President Mohammed Buhari’s victory in the last Nigerian elections is currently in effect, as he is leaving no stone unturned in his determination to reproduce a carbon copy of the Buhari strategy in Ghana’s elections this year.
The Catalyst can reveal that emissaries of Mr. Akufo-Addo are giving the flagbearers of the Convention People’s Party (CPP) and the People’s National Convention (PNC) sleepless nights as they keep knocking on their doors in the cover of darkness with the NPP flagbearer’s plea for them to abdicate their positions and support him to become the next President of Ghana.
In the aftermath of President Buhari’s victory in the last elections in Nigeria, sentiments were rife in the NPP that Mr. Akufo-Addo was going to try to replicate Buhari’s strategy ahead of the 2016 elections. The strategy was that the All People’s Congress’ (APC) Buhari became the presidential candidate for majority of opposition parties in Nigeria, who decided to throw their weight behind one candidate in order to dislodge President Jonathan’s People’s Democratic Party (PDP).
The NPP flagbearer dreams of a similar occurrence in Ghana’s 2016 general elections. He wants to be the sole candidate of all the opposition parties, a feat he imagines will boost his third-time bid and propel him to fulfill his childhood dream.
Information from the grapevine has it that Mr. Akufo-Addo has targeted the flagbearers of the CPP and the PNC for their support ahead of the elections. He is said to be working to conquer them to begin with, and once that feat is achieved, the effect of his move would filter through the rank and file of their parties to good effect for his benefit.
The Catalyst has learnt however that the NPP flagbearer has so far hit a snag, as the separate but similar responses he is getting from the two flagbearers to his plea are firmly in the negative.
Some of the reasons for the outright rejection of Mr. Akufo-Addo’s Buhari-strategy-carbon-copy plea were that the CPP and PNC Congresses gave them, as flagbearers, no such mandate to forge a merger with any political party outside the Nkrumaist Family ahead of the 2016 elections.
The NPP first tested CPP’s pulse when they sent their Greater Accra Regional Secretary, Agyei Sowah, to moot the idea openly while addressing some 2,500 delegates who had converged on the Accra International Trade Fair Centre for the national delegates’ congress which elected Mr. Ivor Greenstreet as their flagbearer for the November 7 elections.
According to the NPP regional secretary, just as the CPP agreed to be part of former President Kufuor’s all-inclusive government from the year 2001 to 2008, where some officials of the party served in the erstwhile NPP administration, the CPP should elect a candidate who will be willing to work with the NPP’s candidate in this year’s elections.
The NPP’s request, as expected, did not go down well with the CPP delegates as they shouted and booed at Mr. Agyei Sowah, bringing the Chairman, Professor Edmund Delle, immediately to his feet immediately after the NPP’s supposed solidarity message, even though he had addressed the gathering already, as he mounted the podium to angrily reject the NPP’s proposal.
Dr. Delle said emphatically that CPP is not going to form such alliances anymore, but added that they are willing to unite with parties of Nkrumaist orientation.
“As a party, never again shall we create the impression that we are not capable of standing on our own. We shall and we must, we can and we must do it. We have the people, we have the men; we have the women and the youth to go forward. We just need everyone including all comrades to unite together and go forward. We are one invincible party and nobody can break us. We should just have a unity of purpose. We do not need anyone to tell us what we can do to win power. We are going to be the masters of our destiny. We shall be in charge of our destiny. No one else will come and dictate to us. This is an important occasion in the life of this party…,” the CPP chairman told NPP.
Yesterday, the Chairman of the PNC, Mr. Bernard Mona, reiterated the position of the CPP chairman, as he denied a media report speculating that the PNC and NPP were to begin talks regarding a possible merger ahead of the elections. Reacting to the story, the PNC chairman made it clear on Radio Gold, an Accra-based radio station that the executive of his party only have a specific mandate from the Congress, to engage in talks with other Nkrumaist parties. He said the PNC is thus in talks with the CPP in this regard.
The PNC chairman’s position on the matter has put another nail in the NPP flagbearer’s political coffin, as he appears to lack the strength to win the next elections standing on his own feet, with his desperate attempt at the ‘Buhari strategy’ failing to work for him.
Mr. Akufo-Addo had had the shock of his life when he decided to compete with Ghana’s President and then ECOWAS Chairman, John Mahama, in the wake of Buhari’s victory in the Nigerian elections, despite frantic efforts by the Ghanaian opposition leader to portray himself as a friend of the new Nigerian leader.
Whiles President Mahama enjoyed all the ambience and courtesies associated with such high level visits, the case of Nana Akufo-Addo was completely different. Aside the little importance that was attached to his visit, pictures of Nana Akufo-Addo’s meeting with the yet-to-be sworn-in Nigerian president showed him sitting in an ordinary front desk chair with his briefcase left on a common wooden table in a chat with his supposed friend.
“Nana Akufo-Addo is too desperate in his quest to become president. To be President is an act of God. And so, it is surprising the extent to which he is taking his desire to become president,” a source told The Catalyst.
