NPP dropped baton for NDC to breast the tape

The declaration of National Democratic Congress [NDC] in December 2008, presidential election by the Electoral Commission of Ghana under the able chairmanship of Dr. Kwadwo Afari Djan, has certainly painted a clear picture of which political party or presidential candidate and his campaign team worked hard for the glory.

Though all the presidential candidates of the various political parties and independent candidates put up a great show in the country's last general election, it could be better said that the two main political parties - National Democratic Congress[NDC] and New Patriotic Party[NPP] - fought intensively for the position making it the most competitive general election in Ghana.

After a peaceful campaign and smooth election, the NDC was declared victorious in a tight election which went through a second run. Like soccer, the best team with good strategies, plans and programmes carry the day whiles the lose side goes back to the drawing board to assess what happened which handed them their defeat, make corrections, practice new strategies, come back to apply and win.

The same goes to political elections where political parties assess situations, adopt strategies that can let them win and put them in place to ensure that they actually win. And when it happens, the defeated side also strategizes and enters the next race with new ideas and confidence to win.

Assessing the situation right begins with electing national party executive officers, forming campaign teams, and adopting strategies among others till the winner is declared.

The NPP dropped the baton which was to power them to win the election, allowing the NDC to hold on firmly to theirs, outrun them to breast the tape.

For instance, the acrimony which saw the election of national party executives created the situation where some members of the executives were tagged as pro-Kufuor and were being pushed there to carry the wish of the out going president. The same situation persisted in the election of the presidential candidate thus creating different groups in the party.

Observation of the numerous members of the party who contested the presidential primary raised suspicions in the minds of the average Ghanaian that they might be looting state funds since majority of them were ministers of state.

Choosing of the running mate to partner Nana Addo Danqua Akufo-Addo, as the NPP presidential candidate almost became a tug of war as a number of NPP hawks expressed interest in getting selected thereby forming various groups within the party going about campaigning for themselves leaving the main agenda of the party which was to attract higher number of voters to enable it win the election.

It would be recalled that consideration of North and South or Christian and Muslim connection as the main procedure for the selection of presidential and running mate for the NPP nearly dismantled the party in early stages as it failed to listen to it's own members advice to use a different system either by selecting the second position - Mr. Alan Kyeremanten - at the presidential primary that was held at the Great Hall of University of Ghana Legon since he has a lot of followers or for the first time elect a woman to pull the votes of women in the country along.

Here comes the place where the NDC really outwitted the NPP to hand them their defeat. It was the adoption of the house to house campaign strategy that led the presidential candidate to come face to face with ordinary Ghanaian voters as they interact to share problems and think together as to how to solve the problems which put confidence in the voters; and this worked perfectly, winning more votes of the undecided and some NPP members to the NDC while that of the strong supporters of the later remain intact.

A recap of the 2000 election reveals the same strategy used by the NPP code named grassroot campaign that enabled the party to wrest power from the NDC. In the last election, they tried to use different strategy focusing on the media, holding big rallies where they got incensed looking at the crowd and thought all was done. Meanwhile, the NDC was also going from house to house selling their campaign message to the people which went down with them and demonstrated it by voting massively for the NDC.

So here comes the point where the NPP dropped the baton for the NDC to relay to victory. The later used big time rallies to win support or votes but lost and later realized that big crowd at rallies do not win election so they changed their class to house to house system campaign.

The NPP assess crowd attendance at rallies to mean they were winning only for the NDC to pick the baton NPP dropped which was grassroot campaign and codenamed it house to house to overtake them to victory.

What was healthy for our envious democracy as a country in Africa was the acceptance of the election results by all the stakeholders and the promise by all to work together to push development agenda forward.

Change of government came and it was accepted by all whilst we put our hands on deck to seek the common good of every Ghanaian citizen.

Let us conceive this in our minds that NDC did not win the election neither the NPP loss too; but rather, it was Ghanaians who won and by so doing we will accept the challenge to contribute our best for the country's growth.

Credit: Stephen A. Quaye.

   Comments0