Posted: Daily Guide |www.dailyguideghana.com
Saturday, 28 August 2010
By Charles Takyi-Boadu
Reports from the Atiwa constituency in the Eastern region where the two major political parties in the country, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and the New Patriotic Party (NPP), are battling for a vacant seat, indicate that the NDC is allegedly employing dubious means to win the seat.
The seat, considered a safe one for the NPP, became vacant following the death of the Member of Parliament, Kwasi Annor Ankamah last month.
Though other parties such as the People’s National Convention (PNC) and the New Vision Party are also vying for the seat, the NDC and NPP have started trading accusations as the campaign intensifies.
National Organizer of the NPP, Alhaji Moctar Bamba told DAILY GUIDE yesterday that agents of the NDC had begun intimidating members of the NPP in the area in order to rig the election.
“They are going round telling people that if they come out they will beat them at our strongholds. Now as I speak there are Azorka boys, the other people are all here, the BNI, the National Security are all here, working for the NDC,” he claimed.
He also alleged that the NDC is bringing fake voter identity cards from places like Akwatia to come and vote in Tuesday’s election.
According to him, they had intercepted about 45 of those fictitious voter identity cards which were going to be used by the NDC.
Bamba claimed that the NDC was doling out cash and other items including second-hand clothes (obroniwawu) to the constituents to influence the voting pattern.
These, he said, fed into a grand scheme employed by government and the NDC to prevent NPP members from voting.
However, the National Organizer of the NPP is optimistic that all these schemes would not yield anything since “we are putting everything in place so that ‘Insha Allah’ we can win the elections hands down.
“But all the same, we are resolute and we feel ‘Insha Allah’, in the name of Allah, we’re going to win hands down.”
Though the Atiwa seat is generally considered a safe one for the NPP, Alhaji Bamba said they would leave no stone unturned to retain the seat and also increase the votes.
Alhaji Bamba said he and other party bigwigs were with the party’s presidential candidate, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo campaigning vigorously and was therefore optimistic that the good people of Atiwa would give the NDC a good run for their money.
But National Organiser of the NDC Yaw Boateng-Gyan has denied the allegations being made by the NPP, saying “so far we haven’t seen any…negative incident.
“They should just come out and tell us one single person who has given out money to any of these people. We haven’t done anything like that,” he said.
He was surprised at the NPP’s claims since at the time of speaking to DAILY GUIDE, they had just come out of an Inter Party Advisory Committee (IPAC) meeting where all the parties had resolved to let the by-election be as peaceful as possible.
Mr. Boateng-Gyan says “if the people of Atiwa are development-oriented, then of course I don’t see why they will not vote for the NDC because there are lots of issues that they are raising in terms of them being neglected by the NPP when they know very well that it has been one of their strong holds.”
He said the constituents were complaining bitterly about how development projects had eluded them, considering the fact that Nana Addo’s mother hailed from the area.
The party, according to sources, was seen at Vanderpuye Village near Ayinam where they were distributing money and other materials.
Meanwhile, the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) has asked the various political parties contesting Tuesday’s Atiwa by-elections to exercise restraint in their actions and utterances.
It called on them to respect the 2008 political parties’ code of conduct which was prepared and signed by them.
A statement issued by the Executive Director of the IEA, Jean Mensa, also called on the voters and all Atiwa constituents to be law-abiding and ensure a peaceful by-election. She hoped this by-election would mark another success in Ghana’s democratic dispensation and electoral process.
The IEA said it trusted the independence of the country’s Electoral Commission (EC) and the capability and sense of professionalism of Ghana’s security agencies in ensuring an incident-free by-election, hoping that Ghana would eventually emerge the winner.