Tamale, Jan. 12, GNA - Alhaji Imoro Issifu Alhassan Umar, the Northern Regional Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), said on Tuesday that there would be peace and security for delegates at the National Congress of the NDC in Tamale.

"This congress would be the most peaceful and well organized in recent times. We are going to prove sceptics wrong and to tell the world that the NDC recaptured power for keeps," he told the GNA in an interview. Alhaji Umar said some people, particularly opponents of the NDC, had started predicting doom in order to use it to score political points "But those who are predicting confusion would be disappointed." He said the Tamale Congress would be peaceful, would leave the party more united to ensure a one touch victory in 2012 and appealed to residents in the Tamale Metropolis not to panic since NDC stood for peace and unity. Alhaji Umar said some people claimed delegates could not be accommodated due to limited hotels in Tamale saying, "Tamale has many and the best of hotels to accommodate all delegates for the exercise." "The NDC is always tagged as a violent party but events in other parties would give Ghanaians the opportunity to judge as to which party is violent. What we are looking for is to unite the country," he said. "We are going to comport ourselves to make the congress a success so that at end of the day Ghana becomes the winner. The security personnel would be on holiday since their presence would only be a formality", he said.

Mr. Albert Atutiga, a former Northern Region Convention People's Party (CPP) Chairman, appealed to NDC to ensure a violent-free Congress. He said the selection of Tamale for such a big National event was a clear manifestation that the NDC had confidence in the people of the Northern Region and stressed the need for a clean campaigning the various positions for a peaceful congress.

"Your biggest political rival, the NPP, organized their regional congress here and it turned 'bloody' so there is the need for the NDC to organize a peaceful congress so as to erase the perception that Northern Region is violent" Mr Atutiga said. Some streets in the Tamale Metropolis are awash with posters of people vying for positions. Though rallies are not organized private vehicles are seen with stickers and posters of some the contestants. Almost all hotels in the Metropolis are fully booked and smock weavers and butchers have increased production in anticipation of a rush for their products during the congress. 12 Jan 10