I won’t quit for Senior Minister ... Aspirant vows

One of the Parliamentary aspirants of Sunyani East, Mr. Kwasi Ameyaw-Cheremeh, who has refused to step down for the Senior Minister, Mr. J.H. Mensah, has, during the week, exposed deals by the minister to get him out of the race. Mr. Ameyaw-Cheremeh, at a press conference organized here in Sunyani to unearth the illegal and rough tactics employed by Mr. Mensah to outwit him, said he had evidently received information from some delegates of the party, whom the MP had gathered at Bob Pierce, a hotel in Sunyani just to corrupt their minds to go against him.

Mr. Cheremeh, who is a Sunyani-based legal practitioner and General Secretary of NALAG, censured the Senior Minister and the Brong Ahafo Regional executives of the party for instructing the selected delegates to append their signatures, under duress, to three blank sheets purported to be the attendants' lists.

According to him, intense pressure was mounted on the Sunyani East Constituency Chairman, Mr. T. A. Gyamfi, who had initially resisted signing the sheets and had to unwillingly abide before leaving the hall.

He noted that, the delegates were thereafter informed that, they had resolved that there should be no primary in the constituency and that the MP should contest unopposed.

Mr. Cheremeh indicated that, though 50 delegates signed the sheets at the meeting, the executives falsely announced that 70 out of the 99 delegates had signed as the true supporters of the Senior Minister, presupposing that he wielded an absolute majority.

“But let me warn that, if the senior minister feels that I'm too formidable for him and the way to avoid me is the resort to the exposed illegality, then I assure him that the fight is not yet over.”

He challenged the MP to shed the veil of “no primary” and meet him in an open, free and fair contest and he would “only assure him of total humiliating defeat,” he said.

The aggrieved aspirant urged the National Executive Committee not to subscribe to the misdeeds and illegalities of the Senior Minister, to ensure transparency and democracy in the party.

The 40-year-old lawyer emphasized that, he had now witnessed the main secret behind the defection of some NPP aspirants and others shifting into Independent race.

He declared that, “I would never go solo if the Senior Minister defeats me in transparent, free and reasonable election, but if I encounter any underground chaos, then I will quit the party or stand as an Independent candidate.”

“But I want to state unreservedly to the executives that, I will never quit the race, because quitters have never won and winners never quit. He who fights and runs away, live to fight another day, and I assure my teeming supporters that I will keenly contest the senior minister and fight to the letter,” he said.

Meanwhile, Joy FM news item on August 27, reported that, the polling station chairmen of the Sunyani East Constituency had endorsed the Senior Minister as an unopposed parliamentary candidate for 2004 elections, while the day for the primary in the constituency had not even been scheduled.

This was followed after the delegates had signed the above mentioned lists for the MP and his team and sent copies to the regional and national executives. Mr. Mensah is now waiting up for approval from the headquarters of the party as to whether he would be allowed to go unopposed or not in the primary.