Technical advisor at the Office of the Vice President, Dr Kabiru Mahama, has revealed that the decision to withdraw from the NPP presidential race by Alan Kyerematen didn’t come as a surprise to the Vice President’s campaign team.
According to him, the expectation of the Bawumia team was that Alan Kyerematen will throw in the towel because any good advisor to the former trades minister would have advised him same. He explained that for anyone with presidential ambitions, anytime an attempt at that particular ambition is made and an aspirant’s chances keeps on dwindling, it will not make sense to go through the process and not make an impact.
“As a politician, you must watch the language of the election, the mood of the people and if I were to be Mr Alan Kyerematen, I would have taken the same decision. I know for sure that he has engaged political consultants, they have advised him on this. So, when we heard of the intended press conference to be organized by Mr Alan Kyerematen, we were clear in our minds that, that probably was going to be a platform to share with his supporters that he was no more on the road… So, that didn’t come to us as a surprise at all…”
Dr Kabiru Mahama
Mr Kabiru further noted that the reasons assigned by Mr Kyerematen for his withdrawal from the race are not tenable. He explained that the reasons are not different from the ones he gave for his withdrawal in 2008 when he lost the election to President Akufo-Addo in the same process.
“If you listen to the reasons, he mentioned then that there were intimidations of his party supporters across the country… The same reasons are given to us today by Mr Alan Kyerematen as the reasons why he is no more contesting.”
Dr Kabiru Mahama
Spirit of NPP with Dr Bawumia
For a politician to be successful in a political endeavor, Dr Mahama stated that he must first understand the mood of the voters, which Mr Kyerematen failed to do. He emphasized that the spirit of the NPP is currently with Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, and it’s imperative party members support him.
“So, if you go to an election and you do not win, the best thing you could have done is to accept responsibility like Mr Kwabena Agyepong did and say the people have spoken. But to assign reasons like the register has been skewed towards a certain aspirant is to fail to take responsibility for your own fault, and I think that that is the bit that’s unfortunate.”
Dr Kabiru Mahama
On the issue of concerns raised on the register, the technical advisor to the Vice President highlighted that the register is a constitutional provision on who is qualified to vote, and amended by the NPP which provides that a certain category of people should vote. Owing to this, he underscored that no one outside of that category was brought into the register to vote.
Moreover, Dr Mahama elaborated that members of parliament who constitute one of the largest groups in the register, were petitioned by Dr Bawumia, as he was the only candidate who went and sought the approval, consent and support of these MPs prior to his decision to contest.
“… In the case of the special delegates, in fact, the northern regions, he had to bring them to a centralized place. Dr Bawumia went to all these people… So, if a person is winning an election by virtue of the hard work and dedication he put into the campaign, you don’t come at the end of the day and lose the election and you want to blame it on others…”
Dr Kabiru Mahama
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