The Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) “pleaded” with the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC) to reconsider its boycott of the presidential debates, General Secretary of the party Johnson Asiedu Nketia has said.

According to him, despite pleas by the IEA for the NDC to take part in the three debates (two presidential and one vice-presidential), the party has not given a positive answer to the institute to that effect, and, thus, was “surprised” to see the think tank advertising that the NDC would be part of the exercise.

“Sometime last week, the IEA sent a delegation to hold discussions with us about the possibility of letting bygones be bygones so we can renew our relationship with them.

“We indicated that: ‘Yes we have only frozen our relationship with them and that we can discuss and get back to them any time after the election; and that is our future relationship with them, but in the case of the debate, since we have committed ourselves and our presidential candidate to another debate that is being organised by GBC, we are unable to participate in their debate.

“They were still pleading that we could consider participating in the two and we indicated that because of the time and the tightness of the time schedule, it will be very difficult to participate, however, we’ll carry their concerns to a larger meeting and get back to them. Since then we haven’t gotten back to them, so, we are surprised that they are advertising our participation in that presidential debate,” Mr Asiedu Nketia popularly known as General Mosquito told Accra-based Joy FM.

The IEA has set November 8 as the date for its first presidential debate for the 2016 elections. It will be held in the Northern regional capital, Tamale.

The second presidential debate will be held in Accra on November 22.

Sandwiched between the two presidential debates will be the vice-presidential debate scheduled for November 15 in the Western regional capital, Takoradi.