Support For Atta Mills’ Door-To-Door

Press Statement In Support Of Professor John Evans Atta Milss’ Door-To-Door Campaign

On behalf of the Banana Inn Branch of the NDC, we wish to congratulate the Presidential Candidate of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Prof. John Evans Atta Mills, and his campaign team for taking the 2008 campaign to the ordinary Ghanaian. This door-to-door approach to interact with the ordinary Ghanaian and to learn of his problems and worries at first hand is a clear testament to his humble personality.

We all are witnesses to the reactions of our political detractors when they learned of our door-to-door activities. As usual, they tried to throw filth, and not dust, into the eyes of the Ghanaian public by declaring that Prof’s political strategy has taken him to a new low, where he has thrown himself into the streets of Accra courting kenkey sellers and taxi drivers. But this exercise, we would like to assure him has, in the light of current events, dealt a huge blow to their diabolic agenda of using the health of the Professor for their publicity stunt. The dividends are that Prof has proved to them in no small measures that he is as fit as a fiddle. Further to this, it has also demonstrated to the Ghanaian public that he remains the silver lining in the political clouds looming over our dear nation currently. For in the estimation of the NPP, the ordinary Ghanaian---the kenkey sellers and the taxi drivers---by whose thumb they are milking the state do not matter in our political scheme. What is clear from this attitude is that the current NPP administration is using “the iron law” proposed by Robert Michels. In the (iron law of oligarchy), power ultimately separate the few leaders from the mass of followers. It is on this basis that we think that politics of this kind---separation of the classes from the masses---is never in the interest of the ordinary Ghanaian. We will therefore call for a political socialization among the NDC rank and file just as Prof has demonstrated. To Prof, we would like to say Ghanaians are better judges who will hand down an irreproachable political verdict come 2008. We would, once again, like to applaud you and reiterate our resolute support for you as the only credible choice to lead our dear nation and lift her out of the social, political and economic doldrums into which she has sunk.

Touching on developments in our neighborhood, it is clear that though our beloved country has carved a constitution that allows for a multi-party democracy with the total recognition and acceptance of all the ancillaries of good governance---freedom of choice of a political party, as one of the numerous choices---our neighborhood is on the blacklist of the ruling NPP for its unambiguous support for no other party than the NDC. The implications are that our neighborhood is being starved of its fair share of the national cake in terms of development. The current leadership has made it a duty to base the selection of areas in the neighborhood for development projects on the support they received from those areas in terms of vote during the last two elections. But the fact remains that when we pay the various forms of tax to the government, there is never any inscription on any contribution that this or that particular tax is generated from a particular area within the constituencies. All taxes go into the national pool and must be shared without regard for voting patterns or whatsoever. Necessity and priority with the most deprived area taking precedence must be our consideration. Any attempt to perpetuate this selective development trend is against the spirit of distributive justice and must be condemned and resisted by all and sundry.

Returning to the issue of political choice, the message must go out to the NPP government that, we the members and supporters of the NDC have chosen the NDC over all other political parties not for political convenience but based on its political philosophy. Being a social democratic party, our interest and concerns are better projected and served by this party. Grassroots participation based on equity, equality and social justice are the benchmarks which offer opportunity for equal participation of the masses based on the ability or capability of the individuals. We, therefore, can say with poise that elitism which offers opportunities to only the privileged, the bourgeoisies and their associates and make certain group of people feel that ruling our country is their birthright, is not a movement we can associate ourselves with. If you must be a son of a former president, if you must be a brother of a sitting president and if you must be a son of a former government member to be granted access to leadership of this country, then we are on the path to institutionalizing mediocrity, in the sense that the most talented who do not have these connections will certainly be deprived of leadership. The bald truth here is that, the NDC is a party of choice; the NDC is where your voice can be heard as an ordinary citizen of this country; therefore, the NDC is our only choice.

Prof., we once again say AYEKOOO; WE ARE SOLIDLY BEHIND YOU!!!