Ashanti Still NPP Stronghold

Mr. Osei Assibey Antwi, the Ashanti regional first vice chairman of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) has disclosed that the support base of the party in Ashanti has increased these past three years the Kufuor-led government assumed office.

Reacting to the claim by the claim by Mr. Ibrahim Inusah, the Offinso South NDC constituency secretary that the Ashanti region had ceased to be the stronghold of the NPP, Assibey Antwi said it is a wishful thinking on the part of the opposition NDC to maintain that notion.

Inusah had claimed that the NPP had lost support because of "unprecedented economic mess, bad governance and massive corruption"

But the NPP vice chairman has defended his position that the NPP has within the last three years increased its membership through massive mobilization drive coupled with the excellent performance of the government.

Assibey Antwi observed that the few NDC supporters in the region are disillusioned since they have come to the painful realization of NPP's chances of returning to power at the next elections.

He likened the behaviour of the likes of Inusah to the proverbial ostrich, which refuses to acknowledge the realities of the times.

According to the NPP guru, the tattered economy inherited form the NDC regime had been resuscitated through an unprecedented economic interventions and the introduction of a fiscal discipline in the economy, which he said, had started showing results.

Explaining further, Assibey Antwi said the cedi had stabilized in value against all major currencies, interest rates have fallen whilst the standards of living has become manageable.

He said the introduction of the Mass Transport system and other interventions in the form of President's Special Initiatives (PSI's) and the mass cocoa spraying exercise which has seen Ghana's cocoa production shoot up to 500,000 tonnes and the massive infrastructure development are all achievement that no objective person can fail to appreciate.

Vice-Chairman Antwi, however, charged that it was the NDC, which looted the economy resulting in the economic mess that the NPP inherited when it assumed the reigns of the government and noted that Ghanaians have now discerned the significant achievements of the NPP government this short time it had been in office.

He assured that the NPP would continue to pursue pragmatic policies and programmes that will place the welfare of Ghanaians at the center and not be detracted from that goal.

According to him the NDC is in a dilemma and, therefore, battling for survival because its flagbearer Prof. Atta Mills has been pushed into the background by the powerful forces which are in control of affairs of the NDC.

Assibey Antwi sounding biblical also asked the NDC to remove the log in their eyes before they attempted to remove that in the eyes of others.

"For a party which is smuggling to even maintain offices in Kumasi contending that the NPP has lost control smacks of dishonesty and avarice." He said and noted assured that the NPP will give the NDC a spanking at the 2004 elections to silence Inusah and like-minded people in the NDC.