Nduom Quits CPP

ON THE MOVE! Dr Paa Kwesi Nduom

Dr. Paa Kwesi Nduom has quit the Convention People's Party (CPP), as he announces a new party which, according to him, will be different from the others and ready to contest the 2012 polls.

The new party, Dr Nduom said, would be inaugurated in the next two months at a congress which will showcase the nature and strength of the grouping.

He made the announcement yesterday at a packed press conference, spelling the end of a frosty relationship with CPP Chairman, Samia Yaaba Nkrumah.

Political observers had envisaged this development and so were not surprised when the one-time Deloitte and Touché staffer made the announcement.

Meanwhile, the CPP has welcomed Dr Nduom's decision to quit the party.

The new movement, which the CPP's 2008 presidential candidate described as a progressive one, will together with other like-minded Ghanaians, wrest power from the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) during the next elections and although this will be a difficult task, as he predicted, he is nonetheless hopeful of victory.

The media personalities who had assembled at the Ghana International Press Centre, Accra, venue of the press conference, were not shocked at the announcement, having expected it long before now, given the recent imbroglio that pitched him against the recently elected chairman of the party, Samia Nkrumah.

'I am here this morning to declare my resolve to work with like-minded men and women from all over the country to form a very focused, vibrant, independent-minded and progressive Political Movement to contest the 2012 Presidential and Parliamentary elections,' he said.

Continuing, he said, 'Our political movement will work hard to be a winner in 2012. It will be difficult, we know, but we are prepared to do everything possible to give Ghanaians an alternative that is progressive and different in a very positive way.'

Dr Nduom had been harbouring an underground political group, Movement for Social Justice, which sources said, he hopes to activate into a full fledge political party.

 
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Yvonne Nduom and kids at the press conference yesterday

It is not clear if the recent party offices allegedly paid for by Dr Nduom in the name of the CPP will be taken over by his yet-to-be-named party.

 'When the Convention People's Party (CPP) opens its nominations next month to elect a Presidential Candidate, I will not participate in that process,' he stressed.

He wished his former party well as it seeks to chart a new course under a new leadership, adding, 'As for me, this is the time to look forward and forward only, to a new and different political order.

'Our new political movement aims to present a credible, united, disciplined and well-organised election machine that is coupled with a clear, specific platform for change Ghanaians can feel in their lives and in their pockets within four years.'

It would be a broad-based national movement composed of people who, according to him, have been yearning for change after experiencing NDC and NPP administrations, both of whom have failed them.

Given the fact that the local electoral laws do not allow for the use of same platform and symbol for presidential and parliamentary campaigns by independent like-minded persons, he said, 'We will inaugurate this truly national political movement in the next two months at a national convention that will demonstrate our true character, strength and the depth of human capital that we are gathering.'

The goal of the party, he said, was to contest the 2012 elections with a positive, progressive, different force not felt in the Fourth Republic.

He posted a positive prognosis of the new party because according to him, it is hinged on the reinvention of Ghanaians, their attitudes and way of life.

The yet-to-be-christened movement, he pointed out, 'Will have a different character - less bureaucratic and more field and action oriented - from what has typically been the case in Ghana in the Fourth Republic.'

Paa Kwesi Nduom asked all who think and believe that Ghana deserves better leadership and the best government possible to join them now.  

The NPP and the NDC may be big established parties but that does not translate into effective leadership. The CPP, the party which won independence from the British Colonial administration, has been engulfed in strings of wrangling in the past few years, with matters getting to a head when the party founder's daughter fell out with Dr. Paa Kwesi Nduom.

 With the gentleman out of the way of the party, observers would be interested in finding out what political engineering strategy the first female chairman of a party in the country would initiate to handle the crisis-laden grouping.

By Cephas Larbi