Prior to the 2024 general elections, all eyes were on “The Bissues” - Charles Bissue and his wife Nana Ama Dokua Asiamah-Adjei - as the couple who were about to make history as the first husband and wife in Ghana’s Parliament.

The Bissues, as it happened, did not set the record of being Ghana's first husband and wife in Parliament. They both handsomely lost their parliamentary elections.

Charles Bissue, the former secretary to the defunct Inter-Ministerial Committee on Illegal Mining (IMCIM), lost the parliamentary elections.

Unknown to the public, a couple who nobody was paying attention to, and the majority of the public did not know were an item, “the Dafeamekpors”, were quietly striving to set this record.

The Dafeamekpors - now Majority Chief Whip and South Dayi Member of Parliament, Rockson-Nelson Dafeamekpor and his wife, an actor cum politician, Ebi Bright - nearly became Ghana’s first husband and wife.

In fact, the Dafeamekpors, whose marriage became public knowledge after a birth message from the husband to the wife, at some point appear to have set this record after Ebi Bright was declared the winner of the parliamentary election she contested in.

Here is how Ghana missed its first MP couple in 2024:

Dafeamekpor win

On December 8, 2024, Rockson-Nelson Dafeamekpor, who had represented the people of South Dayi for two terms, won the seat again.

He polled 16,031 votes, representing 79.5 per cent, to retain the seat, while Godwin Kwame Dadzawa of the New Patriotic Party got 3,853 votes, representing 19.5 per cent.

The two independent candidates in the race, David Awalime and Rose Safor, polled 51 and 94 votes respectively.

Ebi Bright loses Tema Central seat, as EC declares NPP’s Charles Forson winner

TWI NEWS

Ebi Bright’s narrowly contested loss:

Right after winning his contest, Dafeamekpor travelled to Accra and was one of the leading figures of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) who trooped to the collation centre for the Tema Central Constituency after the counting process at the centre stalled.

On December 10, 2024, three days after the voting, the Tema Metropolitan Electoral Officer of the Electoral Commission, Ofusehene Asante Manasseh, declared Ebi Bright the winner of the election. According to the declared results, Bright narrowly won the election with 18,539 votes, while her contender, Charles Forson of the NPP, came second with 18,421 votes.

On December 19, 2024, the Electoral Commission cancelled the declaration of Ebi Bright as the MP-elect for Tema Central, citing a petition by Asante Manasseh, who said he was forced to declare the results in Bright’s favour using results from 146 polling stations instead of 148.

Three days after the cancellation of Ebi Bright’s declaration, the EC declared Charles Forson the winner of the Tema Central seat after the recollation of the election result at the Greater Accra Regional Electoral Commission office.

Dafeamekpor’s presence:

Dafeamekpor was an ever-present figure, always captured close to Ebi Bright, who was pregnant at that time, throughout the commotion and disputes over the Tema Central parliamentary election.

At the regional collation centre, he was the person leading Ebi Bright’s team during the recollection of the results and was captured in multiple viral videos challenging EC officials on the process.

In fact, the Tema Metropolitan Electoral Officer accused him of being one of the people who forced him into wrongly declaring the results in favour of Ebi Bright.

"In fact, Rockson Dafeamekpor kept threatening me throughout the collation process, and whenever I disagreed with him on a legal matter, one of their national executives, Basintale, began inciting their supporters, who had gathered and invaded the collation centre, chanting revolutionary songs," Asante wrote in the petition to the EC leadership.

Meet the Bissues: The 'NPP couple' who lost their bid to be Ghana's first husband and wife in parliament

After the cancellation of the result and subsequent declaration, the now Majority Chief Whip, together with Bright, went on a media tour, insisting that she won the election.

Throughout all this, many believed that Dafeamekpor was fighting to ensure that his party is not robbed of a seat they believed they had won. Not knowing that he was fighting for his dear wife.

BAI



'I don't think he read the law' - Afenyo-Markin launches blistering attack on judge in Abronye case