Afenyo-Markin’s Speech: A Desperate Rebrand of a Broken Tribal Party

At the NPP Delegates Conference, Alexander Afenyo-Markin, the current Minority Leader in Parliament, delivered a fiery and emotionally charged speech aimed at reviving the New Patriotic Party (NPP) after its defeat in the 2024 elections. He painted a bleak picture of the NDC administration, accusing it of economic incompetence, judicial interference, and violent tendencies.

He referenced global political figures like Narendra Modi to inspire party unity, urged a return to founding principles, and claimed the NPP had governed under unprecedented hardship but had still managed to lay the foundation for Ghana’s recovery. He concluded with a passionate call to rebuild the NPP, claiming that the NDC was merely repackaging NPP policies as its own.

A speech built on falsehoods and deflection

Afenyo-Markin’s speech is a masterclass in political gaslighting. He blames the NDC for fuel price hikes, judicial vilification, and galamsey failures just months into its administration, ignoring the catastrophic state in which the NPP left the economy. Under Akufo-Addo and Bawumia, Ghana suffered record debt levels, a collapsed domestic bond market, and a humiliating IMF bailout.

While claiming to have left a strong economy, he forgets that it was the NPP that implemented the most draconian domestic debt exchange programme in Ghana’s history. Thousands of pensioners protested on the streets. The cedi became one of the worst-performing currencies globally under the NPP’s watch. These are not NDC fabrications. They are the bitter truths of Ghana’s economic hardship.

The NPP's Akan identity
Afenyo-Markin proclaims: “We are not Akyem, Ashanti, Fante, Mamprusi, Ga or Ewe. We are NPP.” But this is a laughable contradiction. For decades, the NPP has functioned largely as an Akan-dominated political entity, with its strongholds rooted in the Eastern and Ashanti Regions. In practice, the party has sidelined non-Akan voices and failed to reflect Ghana's true ethnic diversity in leadership and appointments.

If the NPP is truly a national party, why do its leadership structures and policy priorities so heavily favour Akan regions? Why is it that the few non-Akan voices like Afenyo-Markin himself are used more for optics than for true power-sharing? The NPP is yet to convince Ghanaians, especially in the Volta, Northern, and parts of Greater Accra that it respects national pluralism.

His record in parliament
Afenyo-Markin has not exactly embodied the kind of humility and democratic values he extols. In Parliament, his track record has been marked by extreme partisanship, obstructionist tactics, and selective accountability. He has frequently shown contempt for constructive opposition voices and has enabled the NPP's bullying tactics when they were in the majority. His sudden posture of unity and inclusivity is disingenuous.

Let’s not forget how he defended outrageous budgetary allocations, shielded incompetent ministers from accountability, and turned Parliament into a rubber-stamp house for executive excesses. When the NPP was in power, he presided over some of the opaquest governance decisions, including the scandalous COVID-19 expenditures and the mysterious disappearance of accountability on the National Cathedral.

Revisionist history and the "Messiah complex"

Afenyo-Markin’s speech is full of revisionism. The Modi analogy, while creative, is a distraction. Ghana is not India, and the NPP is not a revolutionary force rising from oppression. NPP is the very establishment that has ruled Ghana for most of the Fourth Republic and left it worse off in 2024.

Claims about building more roads, achieving economic recovery, and creating jobs are exaggerated at best and dishonest at worst. What Ghanaians experienced were job losses, collapsed businesses, a broken health sector, and untold suffering. Free SHS, the only somewhat successful policy, was riddled with logistical failures, overcrowding, and funding shortfalls.

Misplaced blame and selective amnesia
Throughout the speech, the NPP’s failings are excused by global events like COVID-19 and the Ukraine war. Yet, many countries, including our West African neighbours, navigated the same global crises without plunging into the level of debt distress that Ghana faced. The NPP simply failed to plan, failed to consult, and failed to govern with foresight.

Moreover, the allegations of political persecution under the NDC government are baseless. What Ghanaians are witnessing is the beginning of accountability, a process the NPP fears because of its sordid record of corruption and mismanagement.

Truth be told
Afenyo-Markin’s speech was less a moment of honest reckoning and more a desperate act of political theatre, an elaborate distraction from the NPP’s dismal legacy. It reeked of revisionism, empty sloganeering, and hollow calls for unity in a party long fractured by its Akan-centred dominance and arrogant disregard for inclusive governance.

While he invokes global figures and lofty ideals, the lived reality of Ghanaians under NPP rule tells a far grimmer story of economic collapse, rising inequality, systemic corruption, and a Parliament turned into a partisan shield for executive impunity.

The NDC does not need to plagiarise policies or repackage failed promises. NDC is building a Ghana for all, not just for a privileged few. As Ghanaians begin to breathe fresh political air, they must be vigilant not to be seduced by the NPP’s rhetorical gymnastics. Afenyo-Markin may have offered a speech, but what Ghanaians demand is truth. And the truth is that the NPP has failed them. Let the NPP rebuild itself truthfully, not through deceitful orations and faux unity slogans. Ghana deserves better.

*Dr Moses Deyegbe Kuvoame is an Associate Professor at the University of South-Eastern Norway.

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