THE RULING New Patriotic Party (NPP) has been described as very unpredictable and very competent at deceiving people who helped it come into power but who held dissenting views from those of the party.
The NPP has further been accused of having an avowed agenda of formulating and implementing policies that were geared towards improving the lot of the already rich citizens of this nation.
These are the perceptions of the Ashanti Regional Secretary of the opposition Convention Peoples? Party (CPP), Mr. Kwabena Anin, who says the CPP worked to make sure that President J. A. Kuffour entered the Castle as the second President of the current fourth republic.
Speaking with The Chronicle, Anin pointed out that after helping the NPP to wrest political power from Jerry Rawlings-led National Democratic Congress (NDC) government in the December 2000 general election, the CPP is now being treated as though it never played any role in bringing the NPP to power.
?When we joined forces with the NPP in 2000 to kick out the NDC government, we (CPP) held the view that after coming to power, the NPP would have appreciated our role and adopted some of the policies of the CPP, which were used by Dr. Nkrumah to move this nation forward over the years. But this has not been the case as the government continues to implement policies that are not in the interest of the ordinary Ghanaian and the development of the country as a whole,? the CPP secretary stated.
He continued that the NPP betrayed the CPP in 1996, when it fielded parliamentary candidates in certain constituencies where the then Great Alliance between the two parties had agreed that only the CPP should select candidates for those seats, while the NPP would be allowed to do the same in other constituencies.
Anin complained that after that painful betrayal in 1996, his party had the hope that eight years down the lane, the NPP might have regretted that unfair treatment meted out to the CPP and done away with that kind of betrayal attitude but as he put it, the ?elephant? party was still hanging on to the betrayal spirit.
The CPP executive narrated how he suffered various forms of harassment at the offices of the regional secretariat of the party in the run up to the December 2000 presidential run-off, when he openly declared that all faithful supporters of the CPP should vote for the NPP to the displeasure of some of the supporters, who thought that all supporters of the party should have been given the chance to make their own choices.
?Initially, I did not have any regrets for what happened to me at the time because I took consolation from the fact that the NDC was eventually defeated and again believed that at least, having helped the NPP to come to power, it (NPP) would appreciate our views in the governance of the state. Today, I have the deepest regrets because all the hopes that the CPP had as a party in bettering the lives of Ghanaians have been dampened,? Anin fumed.
Touching on the recent brouhaha over the legitimacy of the selection of the Minister of Energy, Dr. Paa Kwesi Ndoum, as the party?s parliamentary candidate for the Komenda Edina Eguafo Abirem constituency, he explained that the Central Committee of the party was yet to take a decision on the issue.
Mr. Anin disclosed that the first consideration of the party in the selection of parliamentary candidates was one?s commitment and clearly demonstrated loyalty to the party and stressed that the same principle was going to applied in the case of Dr. Ndoum to establish his eligibility or otherwise as the party?s parliamentary candidate for the constituency.
He emphasized that the CPP as a party of the ordinary people of Ghana, was not copying the expensive procedure of selecting parliamentary candidates like the NPP and the NDC, where aspiring parliamentary candidates were made to pay millions of cedis as nomination fee and also committing similar amounts in their campaigns ahead of parliamentary primaries.