NPP, NDC in blame game over Walewale clash
The Northern Regional Chairman of the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP), Mr Daniel Bugri Naabu, has accused the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) of stockpiling weapons (AK 47 assault rifles) in the region to cause mayhem on election day.
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But the Northern Regional Minister, Mr Abdallah Abubakari, has categorically denied the assertion by the regional chairman and described it as “total lies” and a figment of Mr Naabu’s imagination.
Mr Naabu, at a press conference in Tamale yesterday, specifically levelled the accusation against Mr Abubakari, who is also the NDC parliamentary candidate for Walewale in the 2016 elections, for giving AK 47 assault rifles to his supporters in the constituency and also members of the party in the region to cause mayhem on election day.
The regional chairman, therefore, called on President John Mahama to, as a matter of urgency, call Mr Abubakari to order and also asked the security agencies to deal decisively with the matter to ensure peace before, during and after the elections.
Mr Naabu warned that if nothing was done, the NPP would be forced to use any means to defend its members in the region if there were any attacks on them.
The press conference was to react to President Mahama’s ‘Accounting to the people’ tour to the Northern Region last week
Denial
However, Mr Abubakari has categorically denied the assertion by the NPP that the ruling government is stockpiling arms in the Northern Region to cause mayhem on election day.
In a sharp rebuttal of the accusation levelled against him and the NDC by Mr Naabu, Mr Abubakari described the assertion as “total lies and a figment of his imagination and that of a party chairman and an opposition party desperate for political power”.
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He dared Mr Naabu to make the evidence of his claims immediately available to the security agencies to investigate him and added that it was all part of an attempt by the NPP to “paint him black”.
According to him, the NPP also saw him as a threat to the party’s bid to retain the Walewale seat which it won in 2012.
“As the Regional Minister and Chairman of the Regional Security Council (REGSEC), I will be the last person to do anything to disturb the current peace being enjoyed in the country and throughout my tour in the region I have been engaging with all stakeholders to bring peace to conflict areas in the region,” Mr Abubakari said.
Background
Mr Naabu’s accusation of the government as stockpiling weapons in the region to cause mayhem on election day was based on Saturday’s clash between NDC and NPP youth in the Walewale Constituency which resulted in injury to two persons.
The Northern Regional branch of the NPP alleged that it was the regional minister who had instigated the attack against the NPP youth in the constituency, an accusation the regional minister denied.
Mr Naabu had, at the press conference, called on the police to immediately launch investigations into the clash and bring the perpetrators to book, saying the NPP would not sit down for its supporters to be attacked.
Mr Abubakari, in his reaction, described last Saturday’s clash between the two parties as unfortunate and gave an assurance that the security agencies were on top of the situation to nip in the bud any situation that would lead to violence before, during and after the elections in the region.
Press conference
The NPP’s Northern Regional Communications Director, Mr Mohammed Abdul-Kudus, who read the party’s statement at the press conference, described the President’s ‘Accounting to the people’ tour of the region as a “deceptive guise” by the President to seek re-election and not to account to the people, as he made them to believe.
He called on the people of the Northern Region to reject President Mahama and the NDC at the polls, since a vote for them was a vote for poverty, misery, squalor and unemployment for another four years.