Daniel Nonor
The ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC ) has washed its hands off the violence and growing ethnicity in politics that have characterised the country's body politic in recent times.

According to the NDC, all the ills that have characterised the ongoing biometric registration exercise, ranging from intemperate language, and violence to ethnic politics, could comfortably be laid at the doorsteps of the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP).

The NDC General Secretary, Johnson Aseidu Nketia, who almost declared his party members as being saints at a news conference yesterday in Accra, said he felt vindicated when he, in the recent past, predicted that with the crop of individuals leading the largest opposition party in the country, the chances of the 2012 elections campaign drifting from a contest of ideas to something else was inevitable.

'You will recall that after the NPP congress that elected the current crop of leaders for the party, I commented that judging from the profile and background of the officer, i.e. Nana Addo as flagbearer, Jake Obetsebi Lamptey as National Chairman, Sir John as General Secretary, Moctar  Bamba as National Organiser, Anthony Karbo as National Youth Organiser, as well as Sammy Awuku as deputy Director of Communications, the chances of the 2012 elections campaigns deviating from a contest of ideas and policies to something else was real.'

Mr. Aseidu Nketia further noted: 'Any keen and unbiased observer of the way NPP has so far approached their campaign towards the December 2012 elections will by now agree that the insults that were heaped on me as a result of that statement were totally unjustified.'

Again, making reference to the history of the NPP, Mr. Aseidu Nketia noted without reservations that 'the United Party, the progenitor of the NPP, has its history deeply rooted in politics of ethnicity.'

Mr. Aseidu Nketia, however, chronicled a series of statements from key members of the NPP to justify his assertion. Some of them include statements such as:

'Either NPP is declared winner or Ghana will be turned into Afghanistan -Anthony Karbo, NPP National Youth Organiser.'

'Ghanaian youth should rise up and engage in Tunisian-style uprising -Sammy Awuku, Deputy Communications Director, at a forum with TESCON members in Koforidua.'

Mr. Aseidu Nketia further recalled that 'recently at Odododiodioo, and in the presecence of top hierarchy of the NPP, including former President Kufour, Kennedy Agyapong called for lynching of policemen by NPP youth, amidst thunderous applause.'

He also mentioned an incident an incident in Koforidua, where Sammy Awuku assured TESCON boys 'that immediately the NPP wins the elections, TESCON boys could walk into any government office, drive the staff away, and take any position of their choice, before they could call the NPP national youth organizer to regularise their positions.'

On issues of his accusation of the NPP as being an ethnocentric party, he recalled that 'when former President Kufour was questioned at a public forum as to why majority of his appointees were Akans to the neglect of other regions and ethnic groupings, his response was that he could not find any person of ministerial substance in the whole of the Upper West Region.'

He also made reference to Nana Akufo Addo's 'All die be die' statement. According to him, his (Nana Addo) infamous 'All die be die' statement also referred to NPP members as 'yen akan fuo de,' implying that the NPP was synonymous to the Akan ethnic group.'

He concluded that it does not come as a surprise that 'Kennedy Agyapong should be calling on Ashantis to slaughter people of other ethnic groups, including Gas and Voltarians.'

He added that based on these backgrounds, the 'NDC is of the opinion that NPP is looking for triggers during the biometric registration exercise to unleash the terror they have planned on innocent citizens of this country, and where those triggers don't exist, they seek to manufacture same with the active connivance of media houses that share in this diabolical agenda.'