RE: Alan Kyeremateng-The North has Had Enough of your Troubles I have read an article on most internet portals which seeks to denigrate and drag the name of Hon Alan Kyeremateng, Fmr Pres Kuffour and a host of other party elders hard won reputation into disrepute by one staunch supporter of Akufo Addo by name Razak Osman. I am compelled to rebut to those lies and propaganda as an ardent supporter of Hon Alan Kyeremateng who believes in his leadership style and qualities. The level of intimidation and uneven playing field by Nana Addo and his henchmen is very worrying for the progress and unity of our party. In as much as I always try to avoid the temptation of going back into history, the actions and posturing of Nana Addo and his spokespersons like Mustapha Hamid and bitter Kennedy Agyapong, leave someone like me to dig into the past and expose their hypocrisy, double standards about these intimidating tactics that the campaign team of Hon Alan Kyeremateng is complaining about. The problem for the party, is the apparent hypocrisy that is eating away principles in the party. The Constitution of the NPP, makes it unambiguously clear that MPs are not suppose to publicly declare support for any candidate, in the contest for the flagbearership position of the party, yet not too long ago, when Nana Addo was launching his campaign, we saw and heard MPs, who showed up at the launch to publicly declare for him. Some people, even Executives in the party had suggested that the man goes unopposed. The former General Secretary, Kwadwo Owusu Afriyie, alias Sir John, had claimed that even Nana Addo is in a wheel chair, he will represent the party in 2016. This Sir of Jokes, made this declaration, when he was still the General Secretary of the party. Just recently, the Northern Regional Chairman of our party Bugri Naabu just exposed the level of intimidation that was exhibited by Akufo Addo and his supporters just to intimidate delegates to vote for him. According to Mr. Bugri Naabu, they caused the delegates from the Northern Region to swear to the Bible and the Qur’an that they would vote for Nana Addo and no one else. He is causing a committe to establish and fish out the individuals who went against their oath and then punish such people. He said he is in charge of the region and has the power to act in his capacity and no one should talk about law. What broke the camels back is, where after votes from the Super Delegate Conference in the Northern Region where Nana Addo secured 64 votes, Alan 4 and another candidate securing 2 votes, a party’s Regional Chairman has set up a committee to investigate and to identify the 6 who voted for candidates other than Nana Addo. Internal democracy is badly needed in our party NPP, if we are to make progress. At the moment if Nana Addo Dankwa catches cold the NPP would sneeze. This is an insult to Ghanaians. One begins to wonder how the party will look like should Nana Addo finally retires from active politics. The case of this intimidating tactics gets worse when Regional and Constituency executives who are supposed to be neutral in the discharge of their duties go onto radio stations and support the rather unfortunate and provocative no nana no vote mantra that some characters are chanting in the party. The writer Osman also sought to link the poor performance of our former presidential candidate Nana Akufo Addo in the Northern region in both the 2008 & 2012 elections respectfully to Hon Alan Kyeremateng. I found such an excuse as a mere propaganda and mischief aimed at courting some public sympathy for Nana Addo. The percentage that Nana Addo got in 2008 elections was 57.37%, what at all has Alan got to do with this? Why are people especially Nana Addo fanatics trying to hang onto such uprong strings to hide their incompetence? Alan willingly stepped down for Nana Addo in the 2007 primaries just to promote party unity and cohesion. He campaigned vigorously for Nana Addo in almost all the regions especially the Northern Region. Its beats my imagination why people want to create the erroneous impression that its Hon Alan Kyeremateng whose actions led to the poor performance of Nana Addo in the Northern region. The attempt to link the dismissal of Mr Ambrose Derry who was the Upper West regional minister in November 2007 to Hon Alan Kyeremateng is dead on arrival. While I concede that the man was doing his work so diligently, his dismissal was purely administrative. He was assigned a Minister of State to fill some vacant post at the castle. I dont know how any doubting Thomas could conclude that because of the dismissal of Mr Derry, it was the main architect that led to our party poor and appalling performance in the Northern region in the 2008 elections. With the dismissal of some dismissal of some DCEs barely a month to the Legon primaries, the presidency at that time has the power to relieve any member of their post and allow other people to take over their respective position. Indeed its a known fact that these DCEs who were sacked were all assigned different post in their districts to corporate and work well for the government. The was no level of intimidation nor interference by the Castle and President Kuffour to favour Alan Kyeremateng nor any of the contestants in that epic contest as against Nana Addo . If I am given a chance to talk to Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo face to face, in the absence of his erratic and arrogant supporters, I will definitely tell him that he must call most of his supporters to order who are on a mission to tarnish the reputation of senior members of this noble party. Dr. Wereko Brobbey, Dr Nyaho Nyaho Tamakloe, have all been under the radar of the uncouth characters, who represent the interest of Nana Addo. In all these instances, Nana Addo has never found it prudent and wise to issue a statement distancing himself from the behavior and attitudes of these goons, who represent everything negative about his politics. Dr. Kobena Arthur Kennedy was castigated when he criticized the leadership style of Nana Addo and why he thought the party lost the 2008 elections, in his book “Chasing the Elephant into the Bush, the Politics of Complacency”. He was giving the marching orders amidst insults and threats. Lets protect and promote the good image of our Party by being respectful, sensitive and decorous in our utterances on our ppl on all platforms. Ghanaians av lost confidence in the NDC and the NPP is the alternative. The noise in the media, the insults and divisive comments about our own actions are too much. Democracy must be guided and guarded. We cant be more Catholic than the Pope , even the initiators of democracy dont go dis far. Some people are abusing the right to freedom of speech and democracy. So please lets be more responsible, get serious and focus on the things that unite and strengthen us, so we can work together to regain power in 2016 to restore hope in the many suffering Ghanaians. Thank you. Alexander Sledge Manhyia South Constituency Ashanti Region
Posted on: Fri, 12 Sep 2014 16:35:29 +0000