PNC refutes accusations

PNC leader, Dr. Edward Mahama has dismissed accusations that the party is undermining recent unity talks among minority Nkrumahist parties and the National Reform Party.

Dr. Mahama told the Network Herald that he is the originator and the initiator of the unity talks and so would do nothing to undermine this noble cause which would position the Nkrumahist family well enough to take over power in the next election.

The leader of the Great Consolidated Popular Party (GCPP), Dan Lartey of had accused the PNC of “undermining the Nkrumahist unity talks by adopting an entrenched position.

The GCPP said, "A propaganda material being circulated within the Nkrumahist family by PNC indicates a rigid position adopted to absorb other members of the family into the party under its leader Dr Edward Mahama."

Mr Daniel Lartey, GCPP presidential candidate in the 2000 general election, made the accusation in an interview with the Ghana News Agency in Accra on the progress of the unity talks started in June this year.

Dr. Mahama denied the existence of such a document in the PNC, saying the document being referred to has no signature on it and it is obviously not coming from the PNC because “the PNC has not even taken any official position yet as far as the unity talks is concerned. “I do not want to comment on this accusation, else I lend credence to it. I want to treat it with the contempt it deserves,” Mahama told the Network Herald.

Asked whether he has ambitions of leading the unity party, Dr. Mahama said it is not a matter of whether you want to lead the party or not, it is whether the party would elect you to lead it.

The four parties are aiming at creating a common platform on which they would comment on national issues. According to the PNC leader, “anybody who is interested in the unity talks should not be positioning themselves at this initial stage to lead the party. The creation of the platform is more important. Anybody positioning themselves at this time for leadership is jumping the gun.”

Mahama, also two-time presidential candidate of the PNC dismissed the suggestion that the move of the four parties to engage in the unity talks leading to the forming of one party, is an admission that a single one of them is not capable of providing the much-needed alternative to the NPP and the NDC. To him, it is a method of increasing their numbers in preparedness for the 2004 elections.

Meanwhile, a statement issued by the Inter-Party Co-ordinating Committee (IPCC) of the four parties said the misunderstanding between the members has been amicably resolved.