Chairman of the Organization Committee of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Joseph Osei Owusu, has debunked claims that Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia was given an undue advantage at the delegates conference, which took place at the University of Ghana Sports Stadium.
According to him, all persons who attended the event were given the same treatment across the board, and therefore, the complaints are neither here nor there.
He explained while speaking on Accra-based Peace FM that Dr Mahamudu Bawumia was given the opportunity to speak at the event because of his position as a former vice president and because the party’s former presidents were not in attendance.
To him, that cannot be seen as an undue advantage to the former vice president against other persons aspiring to lead the party as flagbearer.
“All the persons who have declared their intentions to lead were hailed by the delegates and their supporters. Dr Mahamudu Bawumia is unique among all the candidates because he was a former vice president.
Our former Presidents didn’t attend; we have only one former Vice President because the other is dead. He had the opportunity to read a speech, and that meant he had to use the field to connect to the stage. He had an advantage because he was a former Vice President, a position which was not conferred on him by the organizing committee”.
His comments come after some members of Kennedy Agyapong complained bitterly on social media about the failure of the committee to offer other aspirants speaking opportunities and an opportunity to engage the delegates at the venue.
Kwasi Kwarteng who speaks for the Kennedy Agyapong campaign in a post shared via social media said “To the over 200,000 polling station executives who couldn’t attend yesterday’s Delegates Conference at the University of Ghana Stadium but are now watching images and videos to assess who truly has the endorsement and love of delegates, please note that:
With the exception of Dr. Bawumia, no other flagbearer hopeful was given access to the inner perimeter of the stadium to interact and wave at delegates.
The exclusive access, which was conveniently captured and circulated, creates a skewed and clearly engineered impression of massive support.
That, If we want a fair and honest assessment of where the grassroots love truly lies, we must turn our attention to the outer perimeter where all aspirants, including Ken, engaged delegates on equal footing. That’s where organic support can be measured and not the rehearsed endorsement engineered by the organizers. You can even compare the videos of Ken’s entry to that of Dr. Bawumia and you’ll understand the point clearly.
Most importantly, let’s not forget that this same staged settings and optics is what led us into the most humiliating electoral defeat in our party’s history in the 4th Republic. If this is the same path we’re going down again, then it’s obvious we haven’t learnt any lessons. We probably should be considering taking a class at the Patriotic Institute.
Finally, delegates must rise above the drama, the camera tricks, and the stage manipulations. Let us be bold and vote for real change and not a leadership-imposed narrative.
2028 is about winning elections and not choreographed endorsements”.
