Showdown time on Saturday

Come Saturday, over two hundred thousand Ghanaians who constitute delegates of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) will be congregating at polling centres across the nation to vote for the party’s flag bearer to lead it into the 2024 election.

The two leading contestants in what has come to be termed as the ‘Showdown Election’ are Kennedy “Akompreko” Ohene Agyepong, the fire-breathing Member of Parliament for Assin Central in the Central Region, and the soft-spoken but affable Vice President of Ghana, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia.

Ohene Agyapong came second in the Super Delegates Congress held in August this year, where 961 (nine hundred and sixty-one) special delegates voted to select five out of the ten candidates who had wanted to lead the party into election 2024 as presidential candidates. He garnered 132 (one hundred and thirty-two votes), effectively punching the air out of the presidential aspirations of John Alan Kwadwo Kyerematen, who had hitherto been viewed as a favourite.

Alan landed at a dismal third place with just 95 (ninety-five) votes. Following the dismal showing, Alan Kyeremateng found the kitchen to be so hot that he jumped the NPP ship. He jumped out of the NPP wagon to form his own vehicle to try to ascend to the Presidency. So far, one can say that his show has not been inspiring.

In the same event, Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia garnered 629 (six hundred and twenty-nine) votes, virtually leaving all other contestants in the dust and sprinting ahead of his closest contender by hundreds of votes. Even though Dr. Bawumia won the August slugfest, many pundits suggest that the contest on Saturday would see a closer contest between Bawumia and the man who has emerged as an unlikely second, Kennedy Ohene Agyepong.

The two other remaining contenders are not expected to make much of an impact. They are Hon Francis Addai- Nimoh, who has long harboured presidential ambitions but has failed to infuse an image of a ‘President Addai- Nimoh’ in the minds of Ghanaians, and Dr. Owusu Afriyie-Akoto, a relative newcomer to this type of race.

The pair generally have had little or no message to convince voters, and have either lacked the muscle and strategic planning of the Bawumia Campaign, or the glitter and sheer drive of the Kennedy Ohene Agyepong campaign.

Contrasts in character:

The two leading candidates squaring up for the battle on Saturday can be termed as the very epitome of political contrast, and the contrasts have been most telling in the type of campaign they have waged. As the ‘challenger’ in all
senses of the word, we would first look at Kennedy Ohene Agyepong. Ohene Agyepong first burst onto Ghana’s political scene during the administration of President John Agyekum Kufuor, where he first started carving a niche for himself as a moneyed politician with the gift of the garb.

He can talk, talk loudly, stridently, and effectively. He is seen as somebody who really does not care much and gets offended by his talk. Once in a while, he eats back what he has said, but often the damage is done. It has created an
image for him. It is an image that he has not run away from but has cultivated throughout the years since Kufuor, with numerous radio and television programs. And fisticuffs, once in a while.

Mr. Agyapong has not been a stranger to controversy. As a self-acclaimed apostle for integrity, he has picked fights with many, many people, including members of his political party, the courts, social media influencers, and also, once, famously, with the government of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) which led to his arrest. He has a fearsome image as a brawler who takes no prisoners, and that image has meant that he has attracted a constant media storm that is unlikely to wane, no matter the outcome of Saturday’s impending battle. One prediction I can comfortably make is that Saturday will not be the last we hear of Mr. Agyapong.

Ohene Agyapong is also a major financier of the party and once gifted each constituency a pickup vehicle. That, surely, is a man who knows how to make money ‘speak’. The NPP’s humongous victory in the 2016 general election in the Central Region in particular and in some of the Northern regions has been attributed to his financial clout. He is deeply popular among the generality of the population as a ‘grassroots person’, and in him, the opposition party, currently led by a man generally seen as corrupt, would have a battle on their hands, if he were to triumph on Saturday.

However, if Ohene Agyapong contributed to NPP’s victory with his financial clout ahead of victory 2016, it has not been for nothing. As a businessman, it is said that he is a beneficiary of many lucrative government contracts. He is the Head of the Board of Ghana Gas Company and his wife sits on similarly interesting boards. And that is just what we know about how he has benefitted from the NPP in office.

In contrast to Ohene Agyapong’s longer exposure to NPP politics, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia first emerged on the political scene as the protégé of the current President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo in 2006. A quiet person with an ever-present half smile behind bifocals, Bawumia comes off as cool, careful, and calculating, a person who looks at where he is going before he takes a step. Some may even say he is a bit of a cold fish, but he keeps his bite
well hidden.

Even though he was selected as Running Mate out of virtual anonymity to partner Akufo-Addo in 2006, Bawumia has held his own. He became a major thorn in the side of the then-NDC government in the 2012 and 2016 general elections. This was after he partnered with Akufo-Addo in 2008 and lost to the duo of the late (some say unlamented) John Evans Atta Mills and John Dramani Mahama, who went on to become President in 2016. After the 2008 election defeat, Bawumia front-ended all policy statements from the then-opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) from
2008 to December 2016 as the party’s public face, and in 2013, became the party’s principal witness in the famous Presidential Election Petition, where he created the moniker ‘you and I were not there’.

Even though his political pedigree in the NPP is not as in-depth and long-lasting as somebody like John Alan Kwadwo Kyerematen, known in the party since its formative years in the early 1990s, Bawumia has been somebody who discovered an oil well and/or gold mine in the NPP in the person of Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, and has exploited it to great advantage and vision. He was invited and sponsored into the NPP by Akufo-Addo and has demonstrated unwavering loyalty, and hopefully, he may be rewarded for his service to the party on Saturday.

As a northerner, he would neutralize that advantage that John Mahama has traditionally garnered. If Kennedy Agyapong would take the battle to John Mahama, and Bawumia would even the odds against the same candidate in the
Zongos and the northern parts of Ghana.

Character on campaign:

The character of the two men has been demonstrated by the campaigns they have waged. Kennedy Agyapong’s campaign is colorful and has been colorful. It has pinged the public imagination, and he has somehow managed to portray himself in the minds of the general public as the man for the grassroots. Joe Public loves Kennedy Agyapong, and a seriously formidable number of the two hundred thousand plus people who would be voting on Saturday, include Joe Public.

In a nation where the media claims that it is the voice the people listen to, Kennedy Agyepong has become the voice the media follows and talks about, and not necessarily because of any largesse. If anything, he can be termed as a person who ignores Mr. Media unless he is speaking to them directly. Or insulting them.
In this campaign he has not deployed a Media Chairman, and hardly uses his Spokespersons, preferring to use his antics to keep the media fuel going.

He is the epitome of the saying that ‘when it comes to publicity, there is
nothing like bad publicity’. He seems to be a student of the school of politics who says that the worst that can be said of any politician is that he can be ignored. You may like or dislike Kennedy Agyepong, but you cannot ignore
him. He is a spitfire, and you ignore him at your peril.

In contrast, Bawumia’s campaign has been mannerly, strategic, well-crafted, quiet, and fueled by a lot of consideration and deliberation. They do not do things on the spur of the moment. This is good. It also has its
disadvantages.

The Bawumia Campaign is well-organized and well-oiled, focused on delivering a message that is focused on bringing the NPP out of the election on Saturday as something of a composite whole without too many fractures. It looks to the future and has avoided heads-on brawling. They seem interested in saving the baby, where for now, cutting it in two may seem to be a better strategy. In politics, Solomonic wisdom is not always the best.

In contrast to the Agyapong Campaign, the Bawumia campaign has made effective use of media allies. Already with a team of experts working from the Presidency to boost his image as Vice President, he has also appointed smooth-talking old fox Nana Akomea as Communications Director and the dynamic and likable Sammi Awuku as his Director of Campaign.

Both are level-headed individuals and behind them, unseen and unheard but certainly working, are some of the most formidable political heads in the NPP, including arguably, with the notable exception of NDC’s John Mahama, the
most formidable political person in Ghana today, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo. It can be said that the Bawumia Team is that it has managed to coral the Who’s Who of NPP politics behind the band.

Surely, that is a major advantage, some would say. Others would say it is a liability. They suggest Bawumia is the ‘system candidate’. It is not a compliment. With just a few days before the ballots start dropping, one wonders what Bawumia can do about the ‘system candidate’ slur.

Whichever it is, Saturday would decide which of the two strategies and characters would hold sway. What cannot be gainsaid is that post-Saturday, the party would need to get all of its facets and characters behind it before it can make headway in 2024.

Post election:

Three outcomes can be safely predicted for Sunday morning. They are these;
First, Dr. Owusu Akoto-Afriyie and Francis Addai-NImoh would have finally formalized what they have known privately, if not publicly, for a long time; they have lost and lost ignoble. And for all intents and purposes, their
presidential ambitions would have finally and effectively come to an end, permanently.

Second, Bawumia would wake up (if he could go to sleep, that is) on Sunday morning with an even greater press of humanity outside his gates to congratulate him for his victory; or Kennedy Agyapong would wake up (if he could go to sleep, that is) on Sunday morning with a great press of humanity outside his gates to congratulate him for his victory.

Third, NPP National Leadership would be scrambling to talk peace, because permanent cracks have been opened, and unless speedily and strategically addressed, would lead the party into the chasm of defeat in 2024.

By Sunday morning, either Bawumia would have met his ‘meter’ or Kennedy Agyepong would have met his ‘meter’. But whatever, a ‘meter’ would be met by somebody on Saturday.

Then, the real work of victory in 2024 can begin.