NDC Cracks Deepen As Party Searches for Flagbearer

The cracks in the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) is beginning to have a telling effect as party chiefs throw verbal punches as each other.

There currently appears to be direct war of words between Kofi Adams, the National Organiser of the party and Alban Bagbin the Second Deputy Speaker of Parliament, over former President John Mahama.

The latest rift in the part has brought to the fore the deeply rooted signs of factionalism, a claim the part had variously dismissed.

Mr. Bagbin have incurred the wrath of Mr. Adams for reportedly comparing Mr. Mahama to a “reckless driver” who will run the party into a ditch.

He said although he warned Mr. Mahama and his men about the danger ahead in the 2016 elections, he was ignored but his fears came to pass when the party lost miserably in the 2016 general elections.

The Nadoli Kaleo MP claims he wants to prevent an even miserable defeat in 2020, a reason he is pushing for the party’s leadership to be changed.

Mr. Bagbin told some party faithful in the Volta Region that Mr Mahama’s poor leadership skills cost the party in 2016.

“You struggle at the grassroot, you harvest for us to win, usually after that where do you count? That is one of the reasons why you used to hear my voice criticising my own people. Because I could see afar that this driver was driving recklessly and he would get into an accident” …

“I was giving the warning signals. So when I started raising those issues, if my brothers and sisters in NDC had taken note and worked hard, I don’t think we would have lost the 2016 elections with almost one million votes,” he said.

MPs Support

Mr Bagbin also accused some NDC MPs of using false pretences to get some 94 signatures of their colleague MPs to endorse Mahama as 2020 flagbearer of the NDC.

“I am in Parliament and I am aware of what happened in Parliament. Recently a group of young MPs came out to say that 94 of them had supposedly signed a list in support of one of the yet to be declared aspirant of the position of flagbearer.

“I don’t want to go into this but see that as part of the propaganda politics we have in this country,” he stated.

According to him, 50 of the MPs who were on the list later came to him to explain that they were not told the list was an endorsement of the former president.

Destroyer?

But the National Organiser of the Umbrella Party has also lashed out at Mr. Bagbin, insisting the man who wants the lead the party is out to destroy it.

He is scandalised by the recent comments of Mr. Bagbin which aimed at blackmailing and destroying people in the party and the party as a whole.

“If truly Mr Bagbin is not out there to destroy the party, he must be careful with what he says. “For some of us, it is becoming very clear that it is an agenda to destroy the party and not to lead it,” Mr. Adams said.

“Why do you seek to lead the party if you don’t intend to better the lives of people? If I am a leader, I am supposed to give an opportunity to people and lead them from where they were to a better place,” he said.

Crack Whip? 

Mr. Adams had hinted on an Accra based radio station on Monday that Mr Bagbin is likely to be hauled before his party’s disciplinary committee for some comments the party deems to be unsavoury.

He noted the party would take the appropriate steps against Mr. Bagbin in due time.

“You just gave indication of…party’s disciplinary processes and they would be invoked at the appropriate time…” he said.

Mr. Adams stated that such comments from the flagbearer hopeful are designed to destroy the party and the party would take steps to nip them in the bud.

By: thePublisher