Asabee fights party chiefs

The former Information and National Orientation Minister, Stephen Asamoah Boateng has raised issues with a set of guidelines issued by the leadership of the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) for the conduct of the party’s elections.

This, according to him, was because the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the NPP had already indicated the procedure for the conduct of the upcoming elections from polling station, constituency and regional to national levels of the party.

“There is a deliberate ploy to manipulate the system to his favour (the NPP General Secretary) and the current Chairman, Jake Otanka Obetsebi-Lamptey.” He wondered why the two had introduced a set of guidelines for the conduct of the elections.

“When he said there was a guideline coming, I thought Sir John was up to something because he wants to maintain his position because…when you read the guidelines you could see he’s trying to expand in his own capacity and to add few things to it, which were not said at the NEC meeting,” Mr Asamoah Boateng told DAILY GUIDE.

“There was no point of albums coming in; now he is talking about album. The registers should be prepared and sent to the national headquarters and they will validate it and send it to…”

“Can we guarantee the sanctity of that so-called register coming up, why can’t they display the names for people to go and verify?” he quizzed rhetorically.

“They delayed ostensibly to do something fishy. I am not comfortable with Sir John and Jake involved in the whole process of these modalities because they themselves want to stand, and for fairness sake you cannot be a judge in your own court.”

He stressed the need for the leadership of the party to set up what he described as an independent electoral committee to handle the upcoming elections at all levels of the party.

“The last elections we conducted, there was an independent group headed by the Chairman of Council of Elders and the Research Officer whose position is not a contestable one; he is appointed so he has no interest in anybody and then an elderly woman in the community to join and that will be replicated at the national, region and constituency,” he suggested.

Mr. Asamoah Boateng, a defeated Member of Parliament (MP) Mfansteman West, noted that “cleverly, he (the party General Secretary) has avoided that Council of Elder thing at the constituency level for polling station election.

He quoted Clause C2 of the said guidelines under ‘electoral college’ which states inter alia that “the Register to be used for the Polling Station Election shall be the updated polling station register as compiled by the Constituency Executive Committee and validated with the Register compiled by the National Headquarters IT department” to buttress his point.

“Which register has been updated by who…who are the people currently in position. Their position is contestable now.”

“Now they are supposed to conduct or prepare a polling station register of the polling station people so they will skew to their favour people who will in turn come and vote for them,” he claimed.