Kumasi, Sept. 5, GNA - Mr Edward Akuamoah-Boateng, a New Patriotic Party (NPP) Activist, has stated that the successful demonstration of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) in Kumasi on Tuesday is not a guarantee that the party would win the 2004 general election in the Kumasi Metropolis.

Mr Akuamoah-Boateng said irrespective of the number of demonstrations the NDC organises in Kumasi, it would still be impossible "to wrest any of the six constituencies in the Kumasi Metropolis from the NPP".

He was speaking in an interview with the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in Kumasi on Thursday on the impact the demonstration was likely to have on the performance of the NPP in the presidential and parliamentary elections in 2004.

He said demonstrations are most often deceptive and are not the same as casting of ballots, and for that matter they could not be used as a yardstick for measuring or assessing the popularity and success of any political party.

Mr Akuamoah-Boateng stressed, "I am convinced that in spite of the demonstrations the NDC had embarked on, they will even loose their two parliamentary seats in Ashant- Ejura-Sekyedumasi and New Edubiase - to the NPP, come the 2004 elections".

He noted that the popularity and confidence in the NDC had sunk so low that no amount of platform preaching, campaigns and demonstrations could salvage it from the doldrums nor bring it back to power. Mr Akuamoah-Boateng emphasised that as long as former President Jerry John Rawlings continued to behave like the flagbearer of NDC, there was no way the party could ever assume the reigns of government again.