NPP elections: Oware broke promise not to fight me – Jake

The incumbent Chairman of the main opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP), Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey, says he did not expect his first national Vice Chairman, Fred Oware, to contest him.

Mr Obetsebi-Lamptey told TV3’s Hot Issues on Saturday that he was in a haze about why his first Deputy, who had earlier promised not to run for the Chairmanship slot so long as he (Obetsebi-Lamptey) was in the race, could dishonour his own promise.

“…Initially what I heard was that he [Oware] was doing it because he said I had told him that I was not going to contest, ok, or misheard me, ok, and he told me that if I was going to contest then he wouldn’t”, Mr Obetsebi-Lamptey said.

“So I corrected him and told him that I’m sorry, whatever he heard was obviously a miscommunication but I’m going to contest’. Subsequently I expected that he will not contest but even the bug bites you. You decide that you too you want to be boss small so it’s ok, there’s not a problem with it”.

He said Mr Oware “…has to come now and say what it was that he would have done had he been chairman or what it is that he’s going to come and do once he’s chairman, then the party will judge”.

Fred Oware is seeking to topple his boss at the party’s forthcoming March national delegates’ Congress.

Others contesting Mr Obetsebi-Lamptey include businessman Paul Afoko and former national vice chairman Stephen Ntim.