Are NPP Committing Political Suicide with Regard to Election 2020?

To start with, I have shed my political colouration, affiliation and allegiance. Once general elections are over, any idea of partisanship must give way to “Ghana First”. Even before, during and after general elections, any good citizen wishing to obtain the collective interests of Ghanaians, must pursue the course of selflessness, dedication of service to their country and humanity, and of course, exhibit honesty and dynamism in the discharge of their duties to mother Ghana and to Ghanaians.

However, in pursuing my Ghana First agenda, I have realised the sense of imparting my knowledge to those in certain positions capable of implementing them to benefit the general Ghanaian public. Subsequently, I am going to assist the NPP through advice, constructive criticisms and suggestions to enhance, and harness, their ability, good intentions and policies to benefit Ghanaians. Currently, I find their policies more farsighted and with the intent to finally extricate Ghana from the baneful corruption, from kowtowing to foreign countries for alms, from the practice of selective justice, from glaring display of incompetence in running the country, and from the merry-go-round poverty the country and the people are saddled with or mired in.

The Danquah-Dombo-Busia tradition of United Party with its metamorphoses into Progress Party (PP), Popular Front Party (PFP) and New Patriotic Party (NPP), has sadly not had many years in government. This is probably due to the characteristics peculiar to them but which are inhibitive. For the nation’s love at heart, overflowing with farsightedness, and being of service to the people, the NPP are far better than the National Democratic Congress (NDC). However, the NDC have been in government and have the wherewithal to be in government exceedingly longer than the NPP. The questions we have to ask ourselves are WHY and HOW? The answers are not farfetched.

The NPP have always believed in the philosophy of delivery on their electioneering promises as the sole engine to securing them the love of the Ghanaian public to subsequently guarantee them re-election at general elections. With this mentality that is not in alignment with, or out of sync with, the factors influencing the Ghanaian voting pattern at general elections, there is no wonder that the NPP have been lingering in political wilderness for several years since Ghana obtaining her half-baked political independence from the British colonial masters. The comparatively younger or newer party, the NDC, has been in power many years more than the NPP. The NDC are more capable of devising strategies to not only win elections but also, to stay in power longer once elected, more than the NPP. By this, I do not mean to subscribe to their criminal strategies dotted with kidnappings, murders, heaping of insults on some people and setting places ablaze as admonished by the NDC Chairman Samuel Ofosu Ampofo.

The game of successful politics is similar to the game of a successful football team. A successful football team is the team that wins football tournaments by scoring more goals. It is not the team with the best footballers who can play nicely, doing beautiful passes of the ball on the pitch but cannot score goals. A successful democratic party and government is therefore the party that can win elections to stay in power longer, irrespective of whether or not it is able to fully deliver on their campaign promises.

My moments of cogitations about the NPP compel me to compare them to a woman going to her farm. She takes her basket and water but forgets to take her machete (cutlass). In Ghana, if a subsistence farmer goes to the farm without her/his cutlass, it is better she/he never goes at all. There is absolutely not much such a farmer can do for the day.

The NPP have sound policies and wherewithal to deliver them but they have no effective strategies to enable them stay in government longer enough to guarantee the deep-rooted success of such policies. Hence, they come to build only for the NDC to be right at their heels to dismantle whatever they had built. Yes, the NDC are known for always setting the clock of economic progress of Ghana back many years through their bad myopic governance of “Yen enkye ni” as it was obvious during the administration of former President John Dramani Mahama.

To be honest with Ghanaians, the NPP have no strategies in place to convincingly explain and inform the Ghanaian public of their policies, achievements, actions, and problems. They do not see the essence of effective communication in governance. While a few of them like Messrs Kusi Boafo and Kwame Baffoe, alias Abronye, are assiduously explaining the government’s policies, achievements and problems to the populace on air, the NDC are on the other hand not only throwing dust into people’s eyes on air but also, have gone to the ground with their propaganda machine winning the souls and minds of the people. Where are the NPP Communication Teams? To hell with them, the NPP hierarchy might in their minds have said to them; therefore, the collapse of their communication teams right from the national to regional, district and ward levels throughout the nation. This is how the NPP are!

When they win elections, as it was in the era of former President John Agyekum Kufuor and now pertaining under His Excellency Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, the leadership isolate themselves completely from the members by erecting an abstract razor-sharp wire fence around them. They make themselves unreachable. Because of their attitude, no useful information gathered on the ground which needs scrutinizing to help the public and the party can be passed to them. By biting the hand that fed/feeds them, they end up paying a dear price of being kicked out of office. When will the NPP leadership learn that maintaining an effective communication system that reaches every nook and cranny of Ghana is an election-winning strategy?

Let the leaders of NPP understand that they cannot ride comfortably on the back of the implemented Free Senior High School education, the few constructed but under attack “One Village One Dam”, the being constantly criticised NABCO, reinstalled teachers and nursing trainee allowances, planting for food and jobs, as well as the international accolades being heaped on His Excellency Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo as enough guarantees to win NPP re-election in 2020.

What is NPP’s fail-safe plan against the malicious attacks on her policies by the NDC? Fail-safe plan is “incorporating some feature for automatically counteracting the effect of an anticipated possible source of failure”

Some government appointees are not performing satisfactorily, yet the President has not cracked the whip on their back as it should. I have personally not seen any major achievements by the Attorney General. What is she seriously doing about Samuel Ofosu Ampofo, that criminal NDC National Chairman who doubles as a Pentecost Church Elder? He would have successfully been prosecuted, convicted and jailed or compelled to resign his post if he were in the civilized Western Whiteman’s land. I can hardly appreciate the work by the outgoing Inspector General of Police, Mr David Asante-Apeatu, and the Interior Minister, Mr Ambrose Dery. Under their watch, armed robberies, kidnappings, and other forms of crimes are ramifying in Ghana with the police officers openly taking bribes from motorists on Ghana roads with impunity. This is a minus in the governance of NPP. This can never happen in His Excellency Paul Kagame’s country, Rwanda.

Those at the seat of government and closer to the President like Messrs Gabby Otchere Darko, Asante Bediatuo etc., had better tell the President the truth rather than singing his praises and lying to him only to see NPP lose Election 2020 with NDC come to power to set the clock of economic progress back as usual.

Yes, the NPP government are putting in place sound structures to get Ghana back on the right economic path. Nevertheless, many Ghanaians are moaning that life is extremely hard in Ghana for them. The prices of things have skyrocketed. How are the NPP explaining things to them to have them bear with NPP for a while for things to get much better to alleviate their hardships?

Many a Ghanaian is complaining about the collapse of the banks and their businesses. How are the NPP explaining to them why the banks were collapsed and consolidated into one bank? Do you not have any analogies to better explain things to the understanding of Ghanaians?

I shall volunteer strategies and analogies to garner support for NPP because their current lukewarm attitude is unappealing and can possibly endanger their chances of winning Election 2020 to complete the good policies so far implemented by the government. Before then, the President must crack his “hire and fire” whip on the back of non-performing government appointees.

From the information reaching me all of the time, the President was massively voted for by many Ghanaians on the premise that he was going to create more jobs for the people and also, retrieve the embezzled public funds and assets from the perceived corrupt NDC government appointees. Much success has not been chalked in this area. This has culminated in the determination by most people not to go to the polls come 2020 elections. Most of these people who have decided not to vote are NPP members and sympathisers. What does this tell the NPP leadership? Do they still not care because they will never become poorer should NPP lose the election? This is only a question!

Finally, the President should not feel compelled to realise all his electioneering promises but to rather let Ghanaians see that they fall within a long term 30 or 50 year development plan for Ghana by a visionary leader. If he is able to build say, twenty proper dams reaching a number of villages in the north as part-fulfilment of his “One Village One Dam” policy, it is far better than to construct many dugouts only to not have them serve any viable purpose.

Rockson Adofo
(Monday, 22 July 2019)