Former President Jerry John Rawlings has admonished followers of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) to work assiduously to weed out “evil natured” people who have infiltrated the ranks of the party.

Speaking at the 35th anniversary of the 31st December Revolution in Accra, the former president took a dig at the leadership of the NDC for abandoning the principles of probity and accountability, upon which the party was built on.

This year’s celebrations were under the theme: “31st December – the Principles Never Change”.

The former military officer says attempts by some senior members of the party, including him to draw the attention of the leadership were met by fierce resistance from “some uncultured people” who were just interested in perpetuating their corruptible practices in government.

“I was made a scapegoat and insulted because some of us saw the writings on the wall and we wanted to correct them initially. I have worked with bad and wicked people before, but trust me, evil nurtured people should always be kept away.

“…. upon our hard fought victory in 2008, we were joined by some selfish and greedy characters”.

“Ladies and gentlemen, don’t get me wrong; we had good people in the government, but leadership failed to empower them and evil ones overpowered them,” Mr Rawlings stressed to the admiration of his audience.

In his estimation, until the leadership of the NDC shows “remorse for betraying the trust of the people”, the party would struggle to reorganize supporters at the grassroots level.

Nana Akufo-Addo of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) was declared president-elect of Ghana by the Elctoral Commission after he polled 5, 716,026 million votes representing 53.85 % to beat the incumbent President John Dramani Mahama of the NDC who had 4, 713,277 million votes representing 44.40 %