NPP infighting to cost Akufo-Addo 2016 victory

Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, the two-time failed presidential candidate of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), beat John Alan Kwadwo Kyerematen and Francis Addai Nimoh, both of whom contested him for the flag-bearership of the main opposition NPP last Saturday, massively. But political pundits say Nana Akufo-Addo has a burdensome task uniting the fractious NPP to garner victory in the 2016 elections.

With this overwhelming endorsement by the NPP delegates at the primaries, Nana Akufo-Addo will contest the 2016 presidential polls against his main contender, President John Dramani Mahama, the presidential candidate of the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC) who has the odds currently going against him. Analysts contend that though the chances of Nana Akufo-Addo walloping President Mahama in the elections are brighter than in 2012, his third bite of the cherry is being jeopardised by infighting within the NPP by factions paying allegiance to him and Kyerematen.

Kyerematen, former Minister for Trade and Industries, lost the primaries in 2008 and 2011 to Nana Akufo-Addo. The presidential ambitions of the two NPP stalwarts have since 2008 fractured the party as acrimonious accusations and counter-accusations have been hurled by their respective camps at each other. The presidential dream of Nana Akufo-Addo is further threatened by his seemingly playing the ostrich. According to Akufo-Addo, the factionalism in the NPP was "a misunderstanding of the processes that take place in any normal democratic political organisation."

He told Metro TV's current affairs programme, 'Good Evening Ghana,' last Thursday night that "What has kept the NPP together and continues to keep the NPP together ... is that when those decisions as to leadership [and] strategy are made, or concluded in a manner in which the party's own principles, constitutions and culture permits, it allows the party to form itself around and go forward."

The NPP 2008 and 2012 presidential candidate said party members' right to think independently accounted for the perceived disunity within the party. He argued that differences in opinions are bound to occur in the leading opposition party, adding that the differences were a reflection of the letter and spirit of the party's constitution. "That there are factions in the NPP, there is nothing strange or unusual about it. I don't know any of the parties here in West Africa or the democratic parties in the Western world which are monolithic in terms of what leadership or the people think," he volunteered.

In August, the NPP headquarters witnessed a scene of violent fight that pitted factions of the party against each other, disrupting a press conference organised by party Chairman Paul Afoko and General Secretary Kwabena Agyepong, who the Akufo-Addo faction suspect of being allies of Kyerematen. Aggrieved supporters of Nana Akufo-Addo stormed the headquarters allegedly carrying machetes and guns to attack Afoko and Agyepong, leading to a scuffle between supporters of the two factions. Nana Akufo-Addo conceded that the knife-and-gun wielding incident by the angry supporters was "unfortunate", saying it as an unusual.