On The Reshuffle…

The oft-propagated claims by adherents of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) that President Atta Mills is transparent has come under attack, from no less a source than the wife of the founder of the party, Nana Konadu Agyemang Rawlings! Nana Konadu, who is the 1st Vice Chair of the NDC, has waded into the mounting intra party anger over the appointment of three key leaders on the Majority Bench in Parliament for Ministerial jobs.

Mrs. Rawlings told Citi Fm in an interview yesterday that President Mills’ nomination of Majority Leader, Alban Bagbin, Deputy Majority Leader, Hon John Tia, and Majority Chief Whip, Hon ET Mensah for executive jobs, was undemocratic because it was done without adequate consultations with key party figures.

She has therefore faulted party Chairman, Dr Kwabena Agyei, for failing to consult the newly elected national leadership of the party ahead of the nomination of the three majority front benchers for executive positions.

The NDC Chairman had claimed in an earlier interview with the same station that President Mills duly consulted the NDC leadership ahead of his reshuffle on Monday and the decision to raid the Majority front bench was taken along with the NDC Executive!

But this assertions has been challenged by Nana Konadu Agyemang-Rawlings who claims that none of the newly elected executives were consulted stressing that ‘these are the things that have made some of us go into the party so that we will have at least a democratic way of doing things in our party’.

“We have to first find out if Dr. Kwabena Adjei was consulted as an individual or he was consulted as the chairman of our party. If he was consulted as Chairman, he was elected as a member of the party to chair the party’s activities; we also as national executives were equally elected to the party.

“So I think that if he was consulted, then he should also have come to consult the rest of us so that collectively we can give our ideas or feelings towards this decision”, she said.

“The chairman cannot take a decision for the rest of us without informing us, and he is not a rubber stamp’, she fumed. The former First Lady’s comments come at a time the Majority MPs are preparing to face President John Mills to reject outright what they see as the President’s attempt to impose a new majority leadership on them.

Hon. Cletus Avoka and Rashid Pelpuo have confirmed to the media that they are going to be the replacements for Hon Bagbin and Hon John Tia on the Majority front bench.

This assertions has also been challenged by James Agyenim Boateng, a Deputy Minister of Information who said on Radio Gold on Wednesday that the ‘two men did not have sufficient understanding’ of what the President told them.