Mr Francis Addai-Nimoh, a flagbearer hopeful for the New Patriotic Party (NPP), has asked delegates for the November 4 presidential primary not to vote for a government appointee as the Party’s Presidential Candidate.

He said the Party would sign its own ‘opposition warrant’ if it elected a candidate that was part of the current government.

The 58-year-old man, who prides himself as the youngest, but the most experienced contestant in the race, said he had reached that conclusion after studying the trend from 2008.

He, therefore, urged the delegates to vote for him for the Party to retain power.

“The trend is if after eight years you go for someone who was in government to be your flagbearer, then that Party is signing its own opposition warrant.

“So, if you vote for Addai-Nimoh, you know that among the four candidates, the only person who is not part of the ruling government led by Nana Akufo Addo is Addai-Nimoh. So, this trend is there. The only thing to do is to depart from the trend,” he said.

Mr Addai-Nimoh said this in an interview with a local radio station in Accra.

The former Member of Parliament for the Mampong Constituency said since 2008 both the NPP and the National Democratic

Congress (NDC) had failed to secure victory in a general election after presenting a candidate, who was part of a ruling government.

He said the late Professor Evans Atta Mills failed to win the 2000 elections because he was a Vice-President in the Rawlings administration.

Mr Addai-Nimoh also said President Akufo-Addo failed to win the 2008 elections for the NPP because he held a position in the Kufour administration while former President John Dramani Mahama suffered a similar fate in 2016 because he was a sitting President and a candidate for the NDC.

Mr Addai-Nimoh, who started holding leadership positions from Kumasi Senior High as an executive of the Scripture Union

and later went on to become the President of the Student Representative Council at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in 1991/1992 academic year, said he would offer the NPP quality leadership when voted as the Party’s Presidential Candidate.

Born to a police father, Mr Addai-Nimoh said a vote for him was a vote for a unified NPP.

He said the NPP needed someone with an unblemished track record in both public and private life and that he was that person.

About 200,000 delegates of the NPP are expected to vote in the Party’s presidential primary scheduled for Saturday, November 4, 2023, to elect a flag bearer for the Party in the 2024 general election.

The flagbearer hopefuls are; Kennedy Ohene Agyapong, the Member of Parliament (MP) for Assin Central, Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia, Francis Addai-Nimoh, a former Member of Parliament MP for Mampong, and Dr Owusu Afriyie Akoto, a former Minister of Food and Agriculture.

The delegates comprise of all members of the National Council, National, Regional and Constituency Executive Committees, Electoral Area Coordinators, five polling station executives in each polling station (Chairman, Secretary, Organiser, Youth and Women Organisers).