The Ministry of Regional Reorganisation and Development, has denied assertions that the plan to create new regions are borne out of a desire to gain political advantage in those areas.<\/p>\n
Suggestions have been made by sections of the public and members of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), that the attempt to split up traditional strongholds of the party in elections like the Volta and Northern Region, was part of efforts to weaken the NDC\u2019s influence there.<\/p>\n
[contextly_sidebar id=”Ni9qOozXoRxatOT8OzQFe4z3Cdrvuuzn”]However, speaking on \u00a0\u00a0Eyewitness News<\/strong> on Friday, the Deputy Minister for Regional Re-organisation and Development, Martin Adjei-Mensah Korsah, dismissed these claims, insisting that the move to split up the regions was not politically motivated.<\/p>\n \u201cElectorally, it does not matter where a person votes, they can vote in the Volta Region or the Northern Region, your votes counts equally for whichever candidate or party. You\u2019ll not necessarily have to divide a region to make an impact electorally. If the people decide to vote one way ,[it won\u2019t change]. Thankfully that is not the objective,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n He added that, despite only promising to create one new region in their manifesto prior to the elections, then candidate Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo had been presented with requests from several other regions for similar treatment should the New Patriotic Party win power.<\/p>\n \u201cWe indicated in our manifesto that we would create Western North Region, that was the only one we talked about. After the release of our manifesto, when Nana Addo went around the country, the people made demands for the regions to be created. The law does not stop anyone from making those demands, and when we won power, the petitions were thrown at him. It\u2019s not NPP inspired,\u201d he claimed.<\/p>\n Martin Adjei-Mensah Korsah also brushed aside claims that the Ashanti Region, which is a stronghold of the governing party had been shielded, stating that no petition had been received for the creation of a new region.<\/p>\n He however, revealed that, the creation of a new region from Brong Ahafo could affect sections of the Ashanti Region, as the two share a border.<\/p>\n \u201cWe received two petitions from the Northern Region to create two new regions, two petitions from the Brong Ahafo region and one petition each from the Volta Region and Western Region. There were no petitions from the other regions. If you look at the demand for the creation of the regions, it has almost included a section of the Ashanti Region which is in the Ahafo area, so that\u2019s how the Ashanti Region may be affected should the Commission uphold the demands,\u201c he explained.<\/p>\n