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Opinions of Tuesday, 26 March 2024

Columnist: Abdulai Abdul Razak

The need for an all-inclusive approach for victory in the Tamale South Constituency

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Before I shed more light on this piece of mine tailored to the need for an all-inclusive approach toward the bigger hurdle ahead of us as fellow hard-working patriots in the Tamale South Constituency, the sorry state of the constituency needs urgent attention, and it can't come to fruition with a divided front with different camps emanating from the New Patriotic Party (NPP).

First and foremost, the constituency constitutes both rural and urban folks, and it's also among the top twenty densely populated constituencies across the nook and cranny of the country.

The Constituency is faced with a plethora of developmental challenges, both physical infrastructure and human capital. Its bright, unique, and knowledgeable youth are exuberant.

Indisputably, a constituency with its formation from the then-Gukpegu/Sabongida constituency in 2004 has not seen the massive and accelerated development and progress we are yearning for, especially with a member of Parliament from the opposition, the NDC, who has openly taken the good people of the constituency for granted.

Moving forward, the import and drift of this piece will highlight the need for an inclusive approach as a party, the leadership, and members dotted across the length and breadth of the constituency. We cannot continue to adopt and dance to the same tune and expect a remarkable outcome.

According to Moorvia Gooden, "inclusive leadership is about recognizing and valuing diversity or difference, and valuing people, recognizing them for their skills, experience, and talent, and treating them equally and fairly, irrespective of their ethnic background, gender, age, sexual orientation, religion, belief, or any disability they may have."

There are certain baseless and backward approaches we continue to rely on that ineffectively draw back the progress made by the NPP since the formation of the constituency in 2004. We need a new paradigm shift to grind down our challenges as NPP in the constituency.

Unfortunately, the usual let's divide and rule tactics with members comfortably sitting on the fence need a rethink going forward into the December 7 parliamentary elections. The old age issue of new constituency executives and old constituency executives and their supporters continued to stifle the strength, development, and growth of the NPP in Tamale South Constituency.

Respectfully, I have observed and monitored keenly this narrative in the constituency, which needs urgent attention, especially after every internal constituency executive and parliamentary candidate contest in our beloved constituency choking with a varied and huge lack of the needed development, both physical and human.

Interestingly, when one takes a cursory look at these unhealthy issues, it rings the bells of no hope for the party since we have never tried to feel the taste of the member of Parliament being on our side for close to 20 years as NPP members with leadership in Tamale South Constituency.

Realistically, we need terrific leadership at the helm of affairs to change the current narrative, which doesn't inure to the benefit of our party and its survival. Strategic leadership devoid of self-seeking interests from all levels will help to cure the current ailment our party is engulfed in.

It is instructive to note that leaders and their subordinates go hand in hand, and one cannot divorce the two and expect extraordinary results of all-inclusiveness missing at the forefront of every party activity. This implies that we also need a change of attitude as the grassroots of the Party not to be cajoled by people with their interests put forward at the expense of the coordinated interests of the Party.

Put simply, Tamale South Constituency will fall into the hands of the NPP once we can play our cards smartly by putting behind and also burying our differences at the end of every internal contest and the behavior of divide and rule of the base, i.e., the grassroots, which creates sharp division with the unhealthy competition.

Luckily enough, we have an intrepid, committed, dedicated, hard-working, and loyal parliamentary candidate whose contributions towards the upliftment of the NPP in the constituency are not hidden. He has showcased a great sense of magnanimity and continues to spend huge sums of money on the provision of various logistics for the party's day-to-day running and during campaigns.

As it would be recalled, Alhaji Fuseini Musah (Fuzzy) before the internal parliamentary primaries campaigned towards all-inclusiveness and hammered more on the need for us to chart a path of bringing all on board for the battle ahead of us.

As a result of the above, I strongly believe that the time has come for all those who are on the fence observing to get involved and not to sit aloof and expect our parliamentary candidate alone to do the work for the party. We all have a role to play, and we must be ambassadors for trumpeting the vision and policies of our party and the candidate.

It would be insensitive for those who contested and were not successful to fold their arms with their bases for the bigger hurdle ahead, which requires all hands on deck. The same applies to the perceived base who were in support of other candidates to tread the same path of togetherness since the internal contest is done and dusted.

Again, we are all members of the same elephant fraternity, but with varied beliefs and thoughts, but these shouldn't be the basis for any of us to overly dwell on that to the neglect of our core duties as members per Article 3 5(A) of our party's constitution, which stipulates and highlights the duties of every member.

The above article in the constitution states that it's incumbent on us to promote and defend the good name of the party, protect the unity of the party, be loyal and truthful to the party, and abide by and publicly uphold the decisions of the party, among others.

Candidly speaking, the growth, progress, and development of NPP in Tamale South Constituency will depend largely on how we conduct ourselves both internally and externally and the way we attend to or respond to certain pertinent issues collectively through realistic and innovative approaches.

We are all in this together, and our collective resolve and willpower should be on the front burner of success. We should eschew the attitude of maligning and labeling individuals who constructively express their views as all-knowing without adding anything to the beauty of our internal democratic importance and precepts.

Moreso, as the saying goes, "Two good heads are better than one," and this going forward should be the pivot to propel us in unison to foster internal unity and peaceful coexistence. The leadership from the constituency, ranging from the 227 polling stations in the 23 electoral areas, must fine-tune and pledge to work extra hard irrespective of the challenges.

Without any ambiguity, our parliamentary candidate, Alhaji Fuseini Musah (Fuzzy), after the successful internal contest, has embarked on several activities crisscrossing the constituency through intensive engagement with relevant key stakeholders and party people, all geared towards the desire to safeguard the constituency from its current disgusting state.

In summary of the above-mentioned issues and the urgency for an inclusive approach to this year's parliamentary elections, I implore the current constituency executives, past executives, parliamentary candidate aspirants, electoral area coordinators, and polling station executives to come together and strive to salvage the image of the NPP in Tamale South Constituency with the parliamentary candidate, Alhaji Fuseini Musah (Fuzzy).