Spokesperson for the Upper East Regional Campaign Team of Alan Kwadwo Kyerematen, a flagbearer hopeful of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) has downplayed the impact of Vice-President Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia on the party’s victories in the last 2 elections.
Speaking in an interview on State of Our Nation, Michael Abogro said despite the Vice-President being a Muslim, the party did not fare well in Muslim dominated communities particularly the Zongos in recent past elections.
He claimed the party, in the 2020 polls, won in just a single Zongo Community out of the numerous Zongos dotted across the country.
This, for him, debunks the assertion by many that Dr. Bawumia’s inclusion on the NPP’s ticket in those elections soared up its fortunes especially in the Northern part of the country and in the Muslim dominated communities.
“Check the Zongos in the most very recent election which is the 2020, check the Zongos across the country, how many Zongos did the NPP beat the NDC in? The NDC beat us in 99 percent of the Zongos in this country. I think that we won only in one Zongo community, around the Eastern Region, Koforidua area that we beat the NDC hands down.
But there’s no other single Zongo that we are on record to have beaten the NDC in the last election. But the NDC’s pair was Christian-Christian. So how come they farewell in the Zongos?”
Mr. Abogro was speaking in reaction to comments by an elder of the party in the region, declaring the Vice-President as the right candidate for the party’s topmost position.
Mr. Robert Ajene, in an interview on State of Our Nation, argued that Dr. Bawumia, since emergence at the forefront of the party’s politics, has not only demonstrated strong commitment to the cause of the party but has contributed significantly to it gaining grounds in the 5 regions of the North in the 2016 and 2020 Elections.
But Abogro disagreed.
According to him, the Vice-President cannot be credited for the NPP’s wins in those elections.
He contended that every single party member played a role in getting it elected in the 2 elections thus, crediting Bawumia alone for the victories will be disingenuous.
“The successes we chalked in the past I do not think that we pretend to attribute those successes to Bawumia when he was not even a member of the party and I don’t even think that from where I stand it will be convincing to me say that the 2016 and 2020 Elections should be credited to Bawumia because he was the Vice-presidential candidate when we won the elections”.
