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Politics of Friday, 23 January 2015

Source: The Herald

Afoko, Agyapong are useless NDC entities - Bugri Naabu

Controversial Northern Regional Chairman of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Bugri Naabu, is in the news again; the maverick politician has been captured on a secret tape recording describing the National Chairman of his party; Paul Afoko, as useless, who knows nothing about politics.

The loud-mouthed regional party chief is also heard on the tape describing the NPP General Secretary, Kwabena Agyei Agyapong, as a traitor, who is not interested in Nana Akufo-Addo becoming President of Ghana.

He said both men are working for the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and have been placed on the payroll of the National Security, which gives them money and other facilities, including telephone services.

Bugri Naabu revealed that the NPP flagbearer, who does not trust the two officers, now works with the First Vice Chairman, Freddie Blay, through whom all party resources is currently being channeled for distributions to all regional executives and other party officers.

He disclosed that party decisions are made without the inputs of Mr. Afoko and Mr. Agyapong.

Bugri Naabu added Mr. Sammy Crabbe to the list of anti-Akufo-Addo executives, saying the three were heavily sponsored by the NDC government through the National Security, during the NPP Tamale Conference where they were elected.

Additionally, the NPP Northern Regional Chairman revealed that meetings are held these days, which Nana Addo attends and pretends to be contributing, but there is an official one where strategic decisions are made unknown to the National Chairman and the NPP General Secretary.

Nana Addo and his preferred National Executives, he revealed, have already taken a decision on the dates of the Parliamentary primaries and settled on his preferred candidates.

According to Bugri Naabu, the elected party officers who are supposed to be very powerful at the national executive level have been rendered redundant because of their perceived dislike for the party’s 2016 presidential candidate, Nana Akufo-Addo.

He specifically accused Mr. Agyapong of working for and leading the much talked about agenda 2020 campaign; this agenda according to NPP insiders, is to make the Kufuor camp take full control of the party, and eventually decide who emerges as the flagbearer.

The tape making the rounds has had parts of its content already being aired exclusively on the Accra-based Radio Gold for some time now.

Meanwhile, insiders tell The Herald that the recording was made when the executives in the Northern Region organized a meeting recently on the way forward for the party going into the 2016 general elections.

In the said tape, Chairman Bugri, as he is affectionately called, is heard saying that they do not recognize Mr. Afoko, who was overwhelmingly elected in Tamale in the Northern Region as chairman, but it is rather Nana’s preferred Vice Chairman, Mr. Blay.

The tape reveals that aside Mr. Afoko and Mr. Agyapong, the rest of the national executives, such as the Youth Organizer, Samuel Awuku, John Boadu, the National Organizer, and the National Coordinator of the Nasara Club, Alhaji Kamal-Deen Abdulai, and others are cooperating, and onboard with the onetime First Deputy Speaker of Parliament working for the Nana Addo dream 2016.

Party resources, according to Bugri Naabu, are to pass through the hands of the former Member of Parliament (MP) for the people of Elembelle in the Western Region on the ticket of the Convention People’s Party (CPP) Mr. Blay, before distribution are made to the regions.

The tape comes at a time when everyone thinks all is well, and calm returned to the largest opposition party. But in fact, party faithful say, people are pretending all is well and that all the structures are effectively working for the party’s victory in 2016, as compared to what happened when John Kufuor was the flagbearer prior to the 2000 elections.

Nana Addo, according to information emanating from his Nima Residence, says that attempt by him to appoint the MP for Okere and onetime General Secretary, Dan Botwe, as his Campaign Manager, has been shot down by members of the Akyem Mafia.

Reports say that Nana Addo’s nephew and former executive director of a pro-NPP think tank, Danquah Institute (DI), Gabby Asare Otchere-Darko, together with other members of the Akyem Mafia, hold the view that the former General Secretary is disrespectful to them.

It is alleged that one of the reasons for the Akyem Mafia’s refusal to have Dan Botwe as the campaign manager, could be that, he may not allow them to have their way, as they did to other campaign managers in the two times that Nana Addo has led as the flagbearer.