The opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) says delegates of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) have demonstrated that the newly-elected presidential candidate of the ruling party, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, had a credibility crisis in his own backyard.
According to the NDC, the decision of about 39% of the delegates to vote against him during the primary, lent more credence to the fact that Dr. Bawumia was not trusted by his own delegates.
This was contained in a write-up by the NDC’s National Communication Officer, Sammy Gyamfi, to express the largest opposition party’s position on the newly-elected presidential candidate of the NPP.
Dr. Bawumia was elected as the presidential candidate of the ruling party last week when he garnered a total of 118,210, representing 61% of the total valid votes cast, while his closest contender, Kennedy Agyapong, secured 71,996 votes, representing 37.41%.
Dr. Owusu Afriyie Akoto had 1,459 votes, whereas Mr. Francis Addai-Nimo gained a paltry 781 votes to finish at the third and fourth positions respectively. Dr. Bawumia was selected as running mate due to his background as an economist, and eventually became Vice President and Chairman of the Economic Management Team – a position he has held for almost seven years.
In the NDC’s view, if Dr. Bawumia, as the Vice President and also the head of the Economic Management Team, had managed the economy well, the delegates would have given him an overwhelming endorsement.
“Ghanaians were told that he was the economic wizzkid and messiah who was coming to transform the economy and bring about growth, jobs and prosperity for all. When he eventually got the opportunity to manage the economy as Chairman of the Economic Management Team, he turned out to be totally catastrophic and has supervised the most abysmal economic performance in the history of the Fourth Republic,” Gyamfi said.
According to the NDC, Dr. Bawumia had suddenly gone mute on the economy which was his claim to fame, and has now turned himself into a comical digitalisation champion.
This, the party said, was in a bid by Dr. Bawumia to distance himself from the political ramifications of his abysmal performance, after he superintended the near-collapse of the economy.
Though Dr. Bawumia was touted as the “Establishment candidate”, ahead of the primary, a significant number of the NPP delegates, totalling 74,236, constituting a whopping 39% voted against him. Dr. Bawumia was defeated in the Central Region which is one of the swing regions in national elections while he was also rejected by delegates in the Volta Region.
The NDC posited that Dr. Bawumia refused to anchor his campaign on sound economic policies because he has demonstrated gross incompetence and therefore, resorted to playing dangerous ethnic and religious cards.
Sammy Gyamfi pointed out that a state of hopelessness, recklessness, bankruptcy, hardships, corruption and nepotism which had allegedly become the bane of Ghanaians, were products of Dr Bawumia’s bad leadership.
Ghanaians need Change
According to the NDC, Ghana, as a country, needed a change that would retool the country from its economic woes to economic prosperity through an honest, visionary, trusted and experienced leader. Additionally, the party stated that the country needed a tried and tested leader with a track-record of taking responsibility for problems and fixing them.
Sammy Gyamfi added Ghanaians needed “A leader who can and will ensure accountability on the part of duty-bearers both past and present. That leader is none-other than the Nation Builder, H.E John Dramani Mahama.”
The clarion call for this change, the party said, has been amplified by leading figures of the NPP such as Kennedy Agyapong, Dr. Arthur Kennedy, Dr. Nyaho Tamakloe, Dr Amoako Baah among others.
Meanwhile, Dr. Bawumia has reiterated that he would be his own man going in to the crucial 2024 elections as he was fully committed to leading the NPP to secure a third consecutive victory.
“The New Patriotic Party will enter 2024 united and energised. We are ready to make a strong and convincing case for another term in office with a fresh mandate and a new leader”. He said in his victory speech.
However, the NDC firmly believe that a vote for Bawumia in 2024, would be a third-term vote for corruption and to a large extent, create an escape route for alleged corrupt officials to evade accountability.
“We don’t need the very person who has masterminded and supervised the economic mess and hardships we find ourselves in as President,” Sammy Gyamfi strongly posited. Quoting the famous Albert Einstein, Sammy Gyamfi stated that “No problem can be solved with the same consciousness that created it.”
