As readers may be aware by now, Presidential hopeful Mr. Alan Kwadwo Kyeremanteng has withdrawn from the internal party primary of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), citing untenable acts of violences and intimidation against his supporters.
He is not the only one who’s complained about the flawed internal electoral process in their party’s recent super-delegates conference. Others who’ve questioned the credibility of the process include Boakye Agyarko, Kwabena Agyapong, and maverick Kennedy Agyapong.
Alan Kyeremanteng’s withdrawal is not as surprising as paragraph six of his statement which reads in part – “how did we get here as a party in the first place, and how far we are prepared to thread on this dangerous path to self-destruction?”
Did Mr. Alan Kwadwo Kyeremanteng just realize that the NPP has gone rogue? The NPP is run like the mafia. And they won’t hesitate to use coercion, threats, vote buying and violence as we saw in the 2020 general elections.
Where was Alan and the others who’ve complained, when violence was unleashed in a by-election in Ayawaso West Wuogon on 31st January 2019? If they did not see it or read about it in the press did they not, as senior government members, hear about it?
How did Mr. Kyeremanteng and the others think the NPP won the 2020 Presidential election? Did they not read about, or hear of the brutalities and casualties from the 2020 election?
Alan was a beneficiary of a fraudulent election perpetrated against the people of Ghana. He got the unique opportunity to be renominated to serve as a Minister in a government that used thugs in the security services to spill the blood of innocent Ghanaians to win power in the 2020 election.
Any principled person would have resigned from the government of Akufo Addo over the violence; over the assault on the judiciary; over the violence in Ayawaso and 2020 elections, and over the broken economic promises. But he stayed on till very recently. The damage is collective and he can’t absolve himself from it.
Did he not know that the government he served is one built on thuggery? Did he and the others who’ve questioned the process not hear about how a senior police office was beaten up by a private army (invisible forces) of the President? Today these thugs have found their way into the regular security services, with mortifying consequences for the image of the security services.
Alan set ablaze his Presidential ambition the day he accepted to be a member of the government for the second term. There’s no way he can explain away the fact that he wasn’t part of those who crashed the economy.
As decent as he is; as affable as he is; his days and chances of leading the NPP are over. It would be better for him and his supporters if they come to terms with that.
In light of his withdrawal from the NPP race, the best option for him is to form his party if he wants to remain relevant politically. There’s no way the hawks and thugs who’ve taken over the NPP will give up on their stranglehold over the party.
They have become more audacious, vicious, and built a war chest enough to break anyone who stands in the way within the NPP. The Akufo-Addo/Bawumia camp is NPP and NPP is the Akufo-Addo/Bawumia camp as we would see on 4th NOVEMBER when the party holds its presidential primary. Ministers and appointees have been whipped in line. They are incapable of being independent minded about their primary. Publicly going against the preferred successor to the President is grounds for removal from office.
With Alan out of the way, his supporters are more likely to vote Kennedy Agyapong. As to whether that would be enough to pip Bawumia is yet to be seen.
Ras Mubarak
Accra