The woes in the New Patriotic Party (NPP) continue to deepen ahead of the party’s parliamentary primaries which has been scheduled for June 13.
This follows a number of disqualifications that characterized the party’s vetting processes held about a week ago.
Greater Accra Region
[contextly_sidebar id=”ZUJhqSf7ndtiMzqQuMw21yZzn2G4OXIc”]In the Tema West Constituency in the Greater Accra Region, one of the aspirants, Carlos Ahnekora has been disqualified.
According to NPP’s chairman in the region, Ishmael Ashitey, Carlos was disqualified for not contributing to nurturing the party at the constituency level.
Some party delegates of the NPP about a week ago held a press conference warning of massive protests if Carlos Ahenkorah is disqualified.
He was tipped as one of the favorites in the constituency and has the capacity to unseat incumbent NPP Member of Parliament for the area, Naa Torshie Addo.
The delegates claim his disqualification gives undue advantage to the current MP, Naa Torshie Addo but the Greater Accra Regional chairman, Ishmael Ashitey in an interview with Citi News said Mr. Ahenkorah can appeal against the decision.
“The vetting committee has come out with their report, which we discussed at the steerring committee yesterday, and their report is that they have found it necessary to disqualify the candidate.”
Petition appeals committee
He said per the party’s timetable, “the appeals committee of the region will be sitting today… So I called all of them yesterday in the night to inform that about the decision and gave them the reason why they were disqualified. I told him, they said you have not nurtured the party at the constituency.”
“I told him that this is the position of the vetting committee so he can take advantage of the sitting of the appeals committee to come down today and contest the decision and he agreed with me,” he added.
Upon hearing the vetting committee’s decision on Carlos Ahenkorah some delegates gathered in front of chairman Ashitey’s house to protest.
In all 93 aspirants were vetted in the Greater Accra Region and four out of this number have been disqualified.
Aspirant disqualified over false documents
In the Dome Kwabenya Constituency, a disqualified parliamentary aspirant, Isaac Owuraku Amofa will contest the party’s decision of disqualifying him.
According to him, he suspects that the incumbent MP of the area, Adwoa Safo influenced the decision.
In an interview with Citi News, Isaac Owerieku Amofa indicated that he will seek redress at the appropriate quarters.
“We went for vetting and apparently we were told we were going to do the balloting later on but last Friday I overheard some of the regional executives telling me that Adwoa Safo has been calling them to do everything they can to disqualify me,” he said.
So just this morning I received a text message from our constituency chairman. It reads: ‘the regional chairman has directed that you should inform Isaac Amofa the vetting committee has disqualified him on grounds that he failed to present his original certificate to the committee.’ This is a palpable lie…I presented all certificates to them…it baffles my mind. For now I’ve spoken with my lawyers and as the constitution demands, I would have to appeal so I’m going to do that.”
In the Greater Accra Regional Deputy Secretary of the NPP, Adams Sabo Abdul Rahman, has denied any influence of the incumbent MP.
He explained to Citi News why the Party disqualified Isaac Owerieku Amofa from contesting.
“His was put on hold until he provided the necessary documents. We went through the documents and then its like he kept on changing from one document to another. We realized that with such name variations there are no other areas that we can authenticate these things.”
“We asked him to bring his secondary school certificate, he was able to bring it and the name was also different from what he presented earlier in other certificates. I believe this is what the committee looked at very critically because eventually if he becomes the candidate of the party and it turns out that the certificates that you have presented are not the true copies of the certificates he is indicating its going to affect the party. Besides that we didn’t want to have any problem with any of our candidates in this particular exercise,” he added.
Aspirant in Akwatia vows to wrestle power from Baba Jamal
In another development, one of two contenders of the Akwatia parliamentary seat, Philip Owusu Ankomah has expressed optimism of annexing the seat from the incumbent, Baba Jamal of the NDC.
According to him the NDC has failed to develop the Akwatia Constituency hence his optimism.
He said he has what it takes to turn the fortunes of the constituency around if elected as a representative of Akwatia.
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By: Godwin Akweiteh Allotey/citifmonline.com/Ghana