Former President and flagbearer hopeful of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), John Dramani Mahama, says the party will surely win a free and fair election in 2024.
According to the former president, terrified over the imminent victory of the NDC, coupled with the ailing economy, the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) is now appointing politically tainted members to occupy the Electoral Commission (EC) offices, ahead of the 2024 general elections.
Addressing the Nkawkaw branch and constituency executives to wrap up his 3-day tour of the Eastern Region, Mahama indicated that the NDC is poised to train all agents, branch and constituency executives to remain vigilant, act accordingly and police polling stations in the 2024 elections.
“You have to protect the ballot boxes during the 2024 general elections, ensure that no one puts in any foreign materials. We will train you all to police the ballot boxes, we want the elections to be free and fair. If it’s devoid of rigging, we will definitely win by God’s grace. We will not rig the elections, so we don’t expect anyone to rig the elections. The NPP government is scared of us, that’s why they have appointed their own people as board members to the Electoral Commission. But we will defeat them by using Azumah Nelson’s tactics.”
John Dramani Mahama
President Akufo-Addo in line with Article 43 (1 and 2) of the 1992 Constitution, swore in three new members of the EC governing board on Monday, March 20. The three included Rev. Akua Ofori Boateng Salima, Ahmed Tijani, and Dr. Peter Appiahene.
The Member of Parliament for the Buem constituency and the former National Organizer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Kofi Adams, slammed President Nana Akufo-Addo for appointing a known member of the NPP onto the board of the Electoral Commission. He claimed Dr. Peter Appiahene is an NPP activist, who was a patron of the Tertiary Education Student Confederacy Network (TESCON) – a university wing of the NPP.
Mahama Challenges The Media
The presumptive Presidential candidate of the Opposition National Democratic Congress, NDC, John Dramani Mahama, challenged the media to fact check his comment about poor feeding of Senior High School students.
Mahama came under verbal attack by the NPP, when he said even dogs will reject food being served students, under the Free
SHS program.
Speaking to delegates in New Juaben North and South as part of his three- day tour of Eastern region, which ended on Thursday, he explained that “recently I spoke about poor quality of meals for students in Senior high schools. But the NPP insulted me. I want Journalists to fact check. This is a challenge to you (Journalists), go to the SHS students to ask them about the quality of food being served. And as I said with apology, that the food being served the children in school, not even a dog will eat that food in the house. Journalists go to the schools to interview the children and see for yourself if these are the kind of food Senior High School students deserve to eat.”
He claimed the poor implementation of Free Senior High School has impaired quality education at the secondary level, however government is reluctant to listen to stakeholders for review of the policy.
According to Mahama, the constitution envisaged these challenges because it prescribed a progressively free education, which the NDC started.
“When you came, everything Free SHS. Now the children can’t go to school to learn, they go to school three weeks and come home. Their meals are bad. I have seen videos where food were being shared to students, the quality can’t be compared to what we feed them at home. Parents are spending more on children now, than when they were paying fees. That is why we have called for consultation with stakeholders to review. But they went round to say, I said I will cancel it. That is the propaganda they did in 2016 but we started Free SHS with day students. At our time, day students were not paying schools fees in secondary school. We announced we were going to start with boarding students, so in the first year, September, we selected 140,000 boarding students for Free SHS. So, how can I cancel it.”
John Dramani Mahama
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