Parliamentary candidate for the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC) in Talensi, B.T. Baba has rejected claims that his party is sharing goodies to the people in the area.
He rather accused the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) for engaging in such acts.
[contextly_sidebar id=”OeoliC4arWxeJBPzS28WyAGlHgtP2nAS”]According to B.T. Baba the NPP has adopted such tactics because “they realized that their candidate [Thomas Duanab Wuni] is not popular and they are trying to use the poverty level of the people, by giving them those gratuities thinking that they can win their votes.”
B.T. Baba said this in an interview the on the Citi Breakfast Show on Monday following allegations by the NPP that the NDC was bribing the people of Talensi with bicycles, fertilizers, GH¢1,000 and other goodies in a bid to win the by-election in the area which has been slated for July 7.
B.T. Baba said, “to the best of my knowledge, the NDC is not doing that. We rather have evidence to show that the NPP have been involved in such activities since the beginning of the campaign.”
He said the NDC has clearly articulated its message to the electorates in Talensi “which the people have accepted.”
“Our message has been mainly on what we have done over the last two years; in terms of electrification, borehole, health and socio-economic development. The people themselves have accepted that if we are to estimate the cost of one borehole and give them in terms of money, then I believe that they would have said that the money would have been more than the GH¢1,500 the NPP is distributing.”
B.T. Baba said he has also promised to establish “within three months,” a “Talensi development fund” to help boost the socio-economic activities of the people in the constituency.
He explained that because it is difficult to access funding from financial institutions, the fund will provide an “alternative source of income to support their educational pursuit and farming activities.”
“I’ve realized that the traditional source of farming is not attracting the youth. So I’m going to get a mechanization centre formed through the acquisition of tractors which will be made available to them to pursue their farming activities… So the people have bought into the message because most of the times they rely on government resources and the MPs common fund to help them address their socio-economic needs.” he added.
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By: Godwin A. Allotey/citifmonline.com/Ghana