On Saturday, August 26, 2023 a specially selected elite of the New Patriotic Party, called the Super Delegates, gathered to decide which five aspirants among the ten, should qualify to meet the National Delegates Congress, the highest decision-making body of the Party, who choose the flag bearer.
This arrangement, to me does not make free democratic choice of flag bearer a possibility to talk about. And what’s the guarantee that one of those dropped could not win the primaries? I am saying this because of an event in the Holy Bible. Assuming a Super Delegates Congress was held in the house of Jesse, it is very obvious David would not make the first six to even talk about the first five.
I have some problems with this Super Delegates Congress that I want to share.
It is on record that 2,293 delegates out of an electoral college of 2,326, voted during the 2007 National Delegates Congress which chose H.E. Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, as flag bearer.
After this event, the Mac Manu led National Executive Committee thought that 2,326 people can be easily bought over by any aspirant and that would defeat the true freedom of expression qualities of the NPP. So, the electoral college was expanded to include all executive members of the polling stations. So, in the 2010 primaries, 106,500 delegates voted.
A Super Delegates Congress, made up of some elites was imposed upon the party. Their job is to prune down the number of aspirants to five, if they exceeded that number.
How democratic is this? This does not add up, since the Super Delegates has never exceeded 1,000 people. And, so if 2,326 can easily be bought over, then what can’t happen to less than a thousand people?
By the way, those elite got where they are due to the efforts of the Grass Root. They are what can be described as king-makers. They choose constituency executives who will choose regional and national executives. They also directly choose parliamentary candidates who will become MPs. If we want to agree that the Grass Root always chooses the best for the Party, then why should they be denied choosing which five persons can easily win the presidential elections for the Party?
As it stands now, there are suggestions going round that the decision of the 2023 Super Delegates should conclude the process of selecting the party’s flag bearer. This should never be tolerated. The Super Delegates Congress is only part of the process of selecting the flag bearer. Truncating the process here, will rather tear the party apart with serious divisions that will send the NPP into a long stay in opposition. It is like a case where an electoral officer would decide that voting should end at 2 pm instead of the scheduled 5 pm because the ballot box is getting full.
The Super Delegates Congress is like a heat in athletics or semi-finals in some other sports. No matter how well a competitor performs in the heats or semis, they will only get the gold medal if they win in the finals. And there are lots of cases where those who top the heats never win in the finals.
Also, the Super Delegates Congress forms less than 0.005% of the highest decision-making body of the Party, so it is impossible to imagine how its decision should be used to conclude the selection, where in poll sampling 5% is the least, permissible. Going forward, any such decision, would rather tarnish the reputation of the winner, Dr. Bawumia, and it is going to haunt this fine gentleman throughout his political career. Meanwhile, he is never part of this decision.
I will recommend a polling system where if the number of aspirants exceeds three, they must all visit each constituency, interact with the Grass Root and be elected by only the polling station executives. After this, the top three should be voted upon by the National Delegates Congress which should include the polling station executives as well, to determine who becomes flag bearer.
In this way, it is the Grass Root, who will determine those to go for the main primaries. They need to be given some respect.This whole Super Delegates Congress could one day break the Party.
Talking about Super Delegates and its complications, one is shocked to hear that among this elite group is a more superior group which I will call the Supreme Delegates Congress.
Simply put, everybody knows that when a run-off becomes necessary after an election, it is those who voted in that elections who will vote in the run-off. But today, NPP is saying that is not possible. Another group from the Super Delegates called the National Council will vote in a run-off, how so undemocratic.
I keep wondering that supposing more than two people had tied for the fifth position and the National Council alone is chosen to vote at the run-off, and two or more again tie for the first position, who are going to vote for the second run-off?
This will not have happened if the National Council had listened to reason and centralised the Super Delegates Congress, so that a situation like a run-off would have been resolved before dusk, since all the delegates would have been around.
This Super Delegates and now Supreme Delegates should be scrapped.
Hon. Daniel Dugan
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect The Chronicle’s stance.
