[ 2016-12-12 ]

NDC bigwigs hijacked resources meant for campaign in Ashanti – Yamoah Ponkoh
Former Chief Executive of Ejisu-Juabeng Municipal
Assembly, Yamoah Afrifa Ponkoh, says supporters of
the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC)
should look no further than within for their loss
in last Wednesday’s general elections.

According to him, the umbrella family was in pole
position to retain power for President John
Dramani Mahama to continue with his good works for
the country, but had to surrender it the
opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) due to the
personal interest of some stalwarts in the party.

Power, he noted, was handed to the NPP on a silver
platter.

“They [NPP] didn’t work for it. We [NDC] have
played to the gallery of the NPP which is very sad
and painful,” he noted.

Speaking in an interview on Pampaso, a political
talk-show on Accra-based Montie FM, Monday,
disgruntled Ponkoh blamed the party’s campaign
machinery for the heavy defeat they suffered in
the hands of the NPP in the December 7 general
elections.

On Friday, December 9, 2016, the Electoral
Commissioner, Charlotte Osei, pronounced the
NPP’s presidential candidate, Nana Addo Dankwa
Akufo-Addo winner and President-elect for the
Republic of Ghana.

The opposition leader polled 5,716, 026 votes to
beat the incumbent President John Dramani Mahama
who garnered 4,713,277 votes out of the 10,615,361
valid votes cast.

Ponkoh reacting to the defeat of the
“akatamansonians” said he can only point to
the Ashanti Region as the main cause of their
defeat, noting that if the party’s regional
campaign machinery had worked hard, they would
have secured the one million votes they were
seeking for.

The target, he said, would have pushed the
Presidential election to a run-off, believing that
President Mahama would have gone ahead to win the
poll in the second round.

“I will not blame the ordinary person in Ashanti
Region, our target was one million votes. This
wasn’t a joke but the likes of Kojo Bonsu,
Joseph Yamin, Samuel Sarpong and myself were
sidelined. When we talk about NDC politics in
Ashanti Region, you can’t do away with these
personalities.”

“We were completely sidelined during the
electioneering campaign but we did our best and
formed our own campaign team but we lacked some
basic logistics and resources to boost the
campaign. But even if you compare our performance
to that of the regional campaign team, we were far
better than them. Meanwhile, they got all the
resources from the central pool.”

“To me, the work that they did for the party is
the end result that we got. It was so poor. My
problem with the coordinator of the campaign,
Deputy Regional Minister, Andy Okrah – I mean
this is a guy who came from nowhere. Politics is
not about dressing so well. We are talking of the
Ashanti Region which our target was one million
votes which was achievable based on the delivery
of the President. Those who were put in place
headed by this man did very poor in this region.
If you look at our performance in 2008 and 2012
compared to this year, we did poorly. In the
previous election, NDC got even 27 to 28% but this
year we did 23%. If we had amassed at least 27 or
28% in this year’s election that would have
pushed the poll to a run-off and the President
wouldn’t have scored less than 51%.

So, I have been telling people that it is Ashanti
Region that made the NDC lose the polls,” he
noted.

Source - Kasapafm

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