The General Secretary of the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC), Johnson Asiedu Nketia has charged functionaries of the party at the grass root level to spearhead the campaign towards winning the 2016 polls.

According to him, the ranks and files of the party have a crucial role to play in the lead up to the elections, and tasked functionaries of the party at the branch level, especially, to work tirelessly to secure a second term for President John Mahama on December 7.

Speaking at the inauguration of the NDC’s Volta regional campaign task-force in Ho on Sunday, the NDC chief scribe, said the various campaign teams on their own cannot deliver victory for the party, hence the need for the participation of the grassroots supporters in the campaign.

“These campaign teams are not going to actually win the election for us, because no election is won in NDC headquarters. The elections are won at the branches [polling station] and that is where you operate. So whether your names have been mentioned or not, you are the fighters, you are the campaign managers, you are the people who will win the elections for us,” General Mosquito told supporters at event, which also saw the commissioning of the new NDC Regional office complex.

Some eleven regional executives of the party who earlier threatened to boycott the inauguration over claims of being sidelined in the formation of the task-force, were however present at the inauguration following the resolution of their grievances at a crunch meeting prior to the event.

The 15-member campaign task-force is being led by a former MP for Ho Central and NDC’s Director of International Relations, Kofi Attoh.

The General Secretary also used the opportunity to allay fears that, the campaign team will take over the duties of the functional executives and stated that, “the campaign team will not take over the day-to-day running of the party.”

“Your chairman, secretary and organizer will still perform their functions at any campaign meeting. We only appointed a campaign coordinator as liaison between the regional and the national campaign teams. Campaign resources will be sent through the executives and not anyone person,” he assured.

Explaining the delay in releasing the NDC’s manifesto, Mr. Asiedu Nketia said the delay was strategic, to enable the party trumpet the achievements of its 2012 manifesto, before launching the 2016 version.

He however debunked suggestions that, the NDC was waiting on the NPP to outdoor its manifesto first, stressing that the “NDC does not learn from losers, we set the pace for them to copy. So nobody should be comparing our timing and programming with anything to do with the NPP, because we have our own plans that we are following.”

Present at the inauguration were other national executives of the NDC, including the National Organizer, Kofi Adams, Deputy General Secretary, Koku Anyidoho, Vice Chairman and Director of Elections, Samuel Ofosu Ampofoh, among others.

The rest were the regional minister, Helen Ntoso, MPs and other government appointees including MMDCEs as well as Mr. Alfred Agbesi Woyome, NDC financier and a co-opted member of the Regional executive committee of NDC.