NPP leadership race raises questions over party’s ability to rebuild — Achibase
NDC communicator Norbert Achibase questions whether the NPP’s ongoing reorganisation and national leadership race can resolve its internal divisions and position the party for a stronger comeback after its 2024 electoral defeat.
A member of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) Communications Team for the Navrongo Central Constituency, Norbert Achibase, has questioned whether the New Patriotic Party’s (NPP) ongoing national leadership race can produce a leadership capable of addressing the internal challenges that contributed to the party’s defeat in the 2024 general elections and improve its political fortunes.
According to him, the party’s current reorganisation strategy risks carrying unresolved divisions and factional interests into its next phase, raising questions about whether the emerging leadership can unite the party and effectively respond to its challenges.
Speaking on the Big Mike Breakfast Show on Monday, August 24, Achibase argued that the NPP should have built its leadership structure from the grassroots through the polling station, constituency and regional levels before proceeding to the national level.
He described the sequence of the reorganisation process as misplaced, likening it to “wearing my jeans on top and then putting my shirt or Lacoste through my legs.”
Achibase also questioned the decision to elect the party’s flagbearer before completing the selection of some of its other key leaders, arguing that the approach could affect the party’s efforts to achieve a coherent and effective reorganisation.
He maintained that the process had not sufficiently addressed the factional interests that characterised the party’s previous internal elections.
According to him, individuals who were initially not publicly associated with particular leadership contests later emerged as candidates, which he said raised questions about the internal arrangements influencing the elections.
Achibase further questioned whether the current crop of leaders being positioned to lead the NPP could tackle the problems that contributed to the party’s defeat in the 2024 elections.
“Those camps that you took into these regional elections, it is camps that you are going to take into your national elections,” he stated.
He also raised concerns about the nomination of former NPP National Chairman Bernard Antwi Boasiako, popularly known as Chairman Wontumi, in connection with the national chairmanship race.
Achibase argued that the legal circumstances surrounding Boasiako could have implications for public perception of the party’s leadership contest.
He said the NPP needed to look beyond the eligibility of individuals to pick nomination forms and consider how the candidates and the circumstances surrounding their candidatures would be perceived by party members and the wider Ghanaian public.
“If these are the caliber of people that you are bringing, you want Ghanaians to take you serious?” he questioned.
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