NPP Can’t ‘Break The 8’ With Bawumia As Flagbearer – Kobby Mensah

Political marketing strategist Prof. Kobby Mensah has cast doubts on the New Patriotic Party (NPP) stakes in the 2024 election if Dr. Muhamadu Bawumia comes tops in the flagbearership race.

According to the lecturer at the University of Ghana Business School (UGBS), the unfulfilled promises trumpeted during the previous electioneering campaign make it difficult to sell Bawumia to the citizenry as one with any capability at all based on his work as Vice President.

“If they are going with Bawumia then it means that the Presidential candidate image is actually battered. I don’t see how he could really use that particular profile in attracting people unless, of course, the original backers of the NPP,” he said on Wednesday.

Speaking on Accra-based Class FM, Prof Mensah insisted this situation will only get worse if the Vice president decides to woo Ghanaians to his side on the back of policy credibility justifications.

He said many voters will not take Dr Bawumia seriously on his policy pronouncements as flagbearer because “he has actually displayed absolute incompetency and none of those things that he said he was gonna do at maturity for materialized.”

“He actually paraded a certain economic platform, none of which he’s actually speaking [about], now he’s talking about digitalization. So from a policy credibility perspective, he has lost,” he added.

The justifications above, coupled with what he describes as the lost credentials of the government party, the NPP will find it difficult to win the 2024 general election.

“I don’t think that a lot more people have faith in the NPP as we speak. So if you look at all the key factors that could actually sort of engineer a certain victory, completely damaged. So I don’t think that the NPP can Break the 8 as they have actually wished for,” he said.

The NPP is set for a delegates’ conference on November 4 to elect the person to lead its election 2024 campaign as a Presidential candidate.

One of the aspirants, Alan Kyerematen withdrew from the race earlier this week citing intimidation from some top party members.

The balloting scheduled for the remaining flagbearer aspirants of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) has been rescheduled.

During the discussions with the four aspirants and their representatives on September 6, the election committee deliberated on their proposals.

But after these talks, which were held in-camera, the ballot was postponed as the meeting ended inconclusively.

NPP’s Election committee spokesperson, Alexander Afenyo-Markin, however, fell short of revealing what exact issues were discussed.

“We have agreed to proceed with the guidelines. And like I said, when we are done, we will again serve you notice of the guidelines and soon thereafter we will proceed with the balloting,” he said.

Pivotal among the questions posed by the press were the concerns raised by Alan in his letter on Tuesday night.

Mr Afenyo-Markin indicated that the committee is waiting for his team to furnish them with additional information to back his assertions.

Meanwhile, the aspirants were barred by the committee from addressing the media.

Interestingly, one of the aspirants Kennedy Agyapong used a different door in exiting the premises to avoid media attention.

These and other factors point to a cloud of tension hovering over this meeting and its fallouts.

JoyNews’ Samuel Mbura reported that an earlier engagement with Dr Owusu Afriyie-Akoto campaign member was truncated by the committee spokesperson citing a previous agreement not to do so.