Sylvester Mensah, one of the front-runners for the National Democratic Congress (NDC) 2020 flagbearer race has said the selection of the party’s presidential candidate for the next polls must not be by consensus.

“I believe that leadership [2020 flagbearer] must emerge through competitive elections,” he pointed out Wednesday on Starr Chat with Bola Ray.

“And I guess that every member of the party must work towards ensuring that the party moves towards competitive level and that leadership [the flag bearer] emerges through competition,” he added.

He said whoever wants to be the flagbearer of the party must go to the trenches to campaign and lobby for the support of the grassroots, it should not be on a silver platter.

“By so doing you tend to understand the aspirations, the expectations, you get to engage and to know the talents that abound in our party and it makes you a stronger and better person. I’m not saying that that has not happened in the past. But what I’m saying is that we need to deepen that arrangement,” he lucidly stated.

Moving forward, the former NHIA CEO revealed he hopes to “occupy the Flagstaff House” one day, but for now he is “considering” numerous calls on him to contest the flagbearer position of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) ahead of the 2020 elections.

“Do you want to occupy the Flagstaff House (seat of government) one day?” the host asked him on Wednesday.

“Of course!” Mr. Mensah retorted.

Several names have popped up as possible candidates for the NDC after President John Mahama lost the 2016 elections glumly to his rival Nana Addo Danquah Akufo-Addo. Political watchers believe it was the heaviest defeat of the party since the inception of the Fourth Republic.