Remain faithful, united - President Akufo-Addo urges party loyalists

President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has urged members of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) to remain united and maintain their morale.

He advised them not to waste their energy on pointing fingers at one another and apportioning blame because that would not inure to the party’s vision of leading the country into prosperity and progress.

The President made the call when he met with the Greater Accra regional and constituency executives of the NPP at the Jubilee House yesterday.

Just after the 2020 polls, some members of the NPP started apportioning blame. Some of them blamed regional and national executives for causing the party’s loss of some parliamentary seats due to the manner in which parliamentary primaries were organised.

Be content

President Akufo-Addo encouraged members and sympathisers of the NPP to be content with the results of the 2020 general election, particularly the presidential election, in which he secured 51.3 per cent of the votes cast.

He told them to feel proud of the confidence majority of Ghanaians had reposed in the NPP administration.

NDC’s inconsistencies

The President said the National Democratic Congress (NDC) had been making so much noise that it won the 2020 elections but had been inconsistent with the figures it put out.

“The NDC has been inconsistent with the results it says the party won and now it is in court contesting for a re-run of the election,” he said.

With regard to the parliamentary election, he said the NDC started with conflicting results of seats it claimed to have won, at a point claiming that it had won 145 seats in Parliament.

“The party could never be quite clear how many it won — 139, 140 , 141, 145 — and Mahama had won the election,” he quipped.

Preferred party

President Akufo-Addo noted that ever since former President Jerry John Rawlings left the presidential scene of politics, no NDC presidential candidate has won more than 51 per cent of the votes.

He noted that the late President John Evans Atta Mills, who succeeded former President Rawlings, in his first round against Mr J. A. Kufuor in 2000, had 44 per cent in the first round and 47 per cent in the second round.

“When it came to the second time against Kufuor, Prof. Mills got the same figures, and in 2008 when he contested against me, after three rounds he got 50.03 per cent of the votes,” he said.

He said Mr Mahama, in 2012, had 50.7 per cent, and in 2016 had 44 per cent of the votes, while in 2020 he secured 47 per cent of the votes.

“What these figures tell us is that whenever the NPP puts its act together, it wins,” he added.

President Akufo-Addo indicated that majority of Ghanaians supported the NPP.

“The majority is with us, so let us be very clear in our mind. Our opponent, with all the shouting, does not have the support of the majority of the people of our country,” he said.

Country’s future

The President said the future of the country “is in our hands: it is the function of how we behave, how we organise ourselves that will determine how the country will also move ahead”.

He told the party executives that “the most important thing for us to do at this stage is to keep together, reinforce our unity and maintain our morale”.