Square Pegs, Sidelines, Infightings: Owusu-Bempah opens up about NPP’s ‘humiliating’ 2024 Election defeat

The Deputy National Communications Officer of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Ernest Owusu-Bempah, has opened up about the humiliating defeat his party suffered in the just-ended December 7, 2024, general election.

The NPP lost the 2024 presidential election by over 1.5 million votes to the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC).

The party also lost about 50 seats of its current 137 seats in Parliament.

Speaking in an interview with Kwesi Parker-Wilson on Oyerepa TV, shared on Monday, December 23, 2024, the NPP deputy communications officer attributed the defeat largely to voter apathy among supporters of the party and internal issues among its leadership.

Owusu-Bempah faulted the campaign team of the party for their defeat, suggesting that most of the people who were appointed to the team were not fit for purpose.

“Obviously, square pegs were put in round holes in the whole machinery that went into the campaign which I was a part of… a lot of things were not done right. Our people thought that politics is always about roads and bridges and that these things are what win elections but you have to set an agenda.

“That is why I’m saying that square pegs were put in round holes and I would say it any day, any moment. Even when I am called to order, I would say it. And that resulted in our defeat a lot. Because in most of the things that we were doing, a lot of people were just (sic) around, doing nothing but they were expecting results,” he said.

He also asserted that he was prevented from working to galvanise support for the party the best way he could.

He said that most of the programmes he organised to help the party’s campaign were his own initiatives and not part of the broader plan of the party.

“I was crippled not to work. I was not allowed to do the things I am capable of to win more support for the party. I was working on my own,” he said.

The NPP deputy communications officer also indicated that some of the leading members of the party were at loggerheads with some of the party leadership, not picking up each other's calls.

He said that he called a leading figure of the party in the Ashanti Region to discuss the challenges of the party in the region but the person did not respond to his calls.

Watch the interview below:



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