Amoako-Baah slams idea of parliamentary aspirants going unopposed

Dr. Richard Amoako-Baah, a political scientist, has kicked against the decision by the New Patriotic Party (NPP) leadership to allow some aspirants run unopposed in the Party’s impending parliamentary primaries.

At least, 65 parliamentary aspirants, most of them being Ministers and Deputy Ministers of State, are set to go unopposed in the primaries set for Saturday, June 20, this year.

This represents 39 per cent of the 168 constituencies where primaries would be held, and the Ashanti Region has the greatest number of 16 unopposed contestants, while the Eastern has 12 and Greater Accra having seven.

According to Dr. Amoako-Baah, a former Head of the Political Science Department, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), the NPP was established on the basis of freedom, democracy and rule of law.

Therefore, all those who qualified and expressed the desire to contest ought to be given the nod.

“We should encourage those interested in contesting the primaries to do so without any hindrance in order to nurture new breed of ideas for the NPP’s sustainable growth and development,” he noted, in an interview in Kumasi.

The political scientist insisted that any qualified NPP member had the right to contest for the primaries, stressing that those who were denied this right unjustifiably could seek legal redress.

Dr. Amoako-Baah warned that denying interested aspirants the right to contest could spark division and confusion within the Party’s circles with its attendant negative consequences.

Information gathered by the Ghana News Agency (GNA) indicated that some supporters of one Mr. Amofa Agyemang, who has been disqualified from contesting the Bekwai Parliamentary Primaries, are impressing upon the legal practitioner to run as an independent candidate in the 2020 General Election.

According to the aggrieved supporters, their preferred candidate had been treated unfairly in order to allegedly give advantage to the sitting Member of Parliamentary (MP), Mr. Joe Osei-Wusu.

“We are planning an emergency meeting to strategize and decide on the logo to be used by Lawyer Amofa Agyemang if he goes independent,” Mr. Seth Osei, the Dominase Methodist Polling Station NPP Chairman, stated.

Sharing his views on the concerns raised by the aggrieved supporters and those within the Offinso-South, Kwabre-East and Subin Constituencies, Dr. Amoako-Baah advised the NPP leadership to be tactful in resolving those issues.

“It is possible to bring all hands on board if the leaders give a fair hearing to the concerns raised by the aggrieved supporters,” he noted.