NPP national elections: Are ‘they’ listening to what ‘the voices’ are saying ?

• President Nana Addo Dankw Akufo-Addo (middle) with the new NPP National Executives

Political parties recruit, nominate and campaign to elect public officials; draw up policy programmes for the government if they are in the majority: offer criticisms and alternative policies if they are in opposition.

Political parties also mobilise support for common policies among different interest groups; educate the public about public issues and provide structure and rules for the society’s political debates.

In some political systems, ideology may be an important factor in recruiting and motivating party members. Elsewhere, similar economic interests or social outlook may be more important than ideological commitment.

Political parties are as varied as the societies in which they function. The election campaigns they conduct are often elaborate, usually time-consuming, sometimes silly.

But the function of election campaigns is deadly serious; to provide a peaceful and fair method by which the citizens of a democracy can select their leaders and have a meaningful role in determining their own destiny.

The voices of democracy include those of the government, its political supporters and the opposition.

But they are joined by the voices of the labour unions, organised interest groups, community associations, the news media, the social media, scholars and critics, religious leaders and writers, small businesses and large corporations, churches and schools.

All these groups are free to raise their voices and participate in the democratic political process, whether locally or nationally.

That is the more reason why the national delegates, conference of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP), held on the 16th July, 2022,  at the Accra Sports Stadium, is still attracting “voices” from far and near.

Over 6,000 delegates from all the 16 regions of the country, plus delegates from the diaspora voted at the conference to elect 10 new national executive officers of the party, out of the 46 candidates who contested the positions.

The positions contested included; National Chairperson, National Vice Chairpersons, General Secretary, National Organiser, Women’s Organiser and National Youth Organiser.

Amidst bribery allegations and injunctions, new officials were elected to lead the party in the 2024 general elections.

And the new national  officers of the party include, Stephen Ayesu Ntim (Chairman), Justin Frimpong Kodua (Secretary), Henry Nana Boakye (National Organiser), Salaam Mustapha Mohammed (National Youth Organiser), Kate Gyamfua (National Women’s Organiser) and Dr Charles Dwamena (National Treasurer).

Some of the diverse ‘political voices’  ‘crying in the wilderness’ and seeking to be heard are saying: “To foster unity in the NPP and to achieve the desired collective results, the government must ’embrace’ the new national executives of the party and work with them.

“The tag of family and friends of certain key people in government filling employment positions with their numerous kith and kin, to the neglect of others in the party who also contributed to sustain it, is dragging the party in the mud and must be curtailed.

“The allegation of inflated contracts skewing to certain people who are not even delivering such contracts to expectation, is a source of worry to party faithfuls and must be investigated and quickly addressed.”

Readers, expectations from the new national executives by some ‘agonising’ party members include a complete overhaul of the party’s communication machinery, describing it as ‘very weak’, in responding to the urgent needs of the times.

In its place, some of the ‘agonising’ party members are calling  for a very strong and effective party communication machinery to deliver on its established mandate.

They contend that those to be recruited and employed to man the communication machinery of the party, must be tried and tested communication professionals who must deliver per the terms of their engagements.

They state that the party must have ‘adequate’,  ‘solid’ and ‘liquid’  communication budget to prosecute the communication agenda of the party and government ‘at all levels’; claiming that the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) has made ‘useless’, the communication machinery of the NPP at all levels of governance.

The ‘agonising’ party members are also asking the new national party executives to draw a programme to meet all ‘abandoned’, ‘neglected’ and ‘disused’ groups in the party by the erstwhile NPP national executives; including former Members of Parliament, former Metropolitan, Municipal and District Chief Executives, former Ministers of State and former party executives at all levels, insisting that to break the EIGHT, ‘all hands must be on deck.’

They are also alerting the new national party executives to ensure that “henceforth, money must not be extorted from party members before certain jobs are allocated to them” and called for swift investigation into such matters.

They are also urging the new national executives to devise a system to monitor and evaluate the performance of all government appointees, including Ministers, Chief Executive Officers and MMDCEs to ensure that their delivery  meet the expectations of the party, government and the people of Ghana; so that come the 2024 general elections, they can acquit themselves.

Additionally, they are alerting the new national executives to roll out sustained orientation programmes for all party executives across the country, particularly for Regional and Constituency Chairmen “since some of them  constantly embarrass  the party with their weird utterances and general behaviour.”

Readers, from what “the voices” are saying; will “they” really be listening ?

By G. Frank Asmah

Contact email/ WhatsApp of the author:

asmahfrankg@gmail.com (0505556179)