Vice Prez To Surprise Sceptics

Recent media speculations about the probability of President Kufuor dropping his vice, Alhaji Aliu Mahama have been traced to some politicians and traditional authorities who want to smear him before the 2004 elections. A source close to the NPP headquarters told “The Evening News” that Alhaji Mahama remains unruffled in his commitment to work with the President to achieve the vision that the party had set out before the nation.

It said the rumours being peddled about the alleged intent of the President not to nominate Alhaji Mahama started soon after people who accused him of being party to the criminal murder of the late Ya Na Yakubu Andani failed to link him to the murder.

“Subsequently, they resorted to the age old practice of planting stories in the media, just to discredit the vice President and to create disaffection towards him within the party and in the Dagbon area in particular”, he said.

According to the source, the intent of those behind the reports was to make it appear as though the vice President has lost the support and confidence of the people of Northern Ghana, who played a key role in ensuring victory for the NPP in the year 2000 elections.

The source said the vice President has stayed away from speaking on the issue because his nomination or otherwise remained the prerogative of the President and no one else.

Attempts to speak to the vice President or his aides on the issue were met with cold evasion, but one official said the issue is the President’s prerogative and therefore in the interim, there would be no comments on it.