Diaspora News of Tuesday, 13 February 2007

Source: ournewcpp@yahoo.com

NewCPP is a movement not a political party

Ladies and Gentlemen, fellow Ghanaians, normally we would not respond to traitors, the NewCPP would like to set the record straight.

Last week we spoke to Akomfrah and explained what we were about. He asked for membership dues. We explained that we will send him money at the right time. They asked us our mission and our commitment to the CPP which we emphatically stated to the satisfaction of several of the US members. So we are surprised by the falsehoods being peddled. We are quiet flattered that they feel so threatened to issue such falsehoods. But there is an email trail and if they issue any further falsehoods we would publish all emails to show how a few people think they alone, can dictate what the CPP does and how people who support the party should behave.

To set the records straight, as we assured Akomfrah, Ato Sackey and our Ghanaian colleagues over the weekend, we are a movement, not a political party. We explained clearly our mission; to seek reform, mobilise our youth and those who have lost hope in politics and in particular in the CPP, as well as hope in NPP and NDC parties, to believe that we can all make a difference by putting Ghana First. We are committed to reforming the CPP, modernising it, bringing in the youth and making it electable. Ours is a movement across class, across old political boundaries, for all those yearning for a new type of political party that once again will represent all Ghanaians. Most importantly, we want to work with like minded people to create a Ghana where opportunity and the basics of a good life are available to every Ghanaian not just those in the cities; a society where government defends and promotes the rights of the poor and the disadvantage not just the powerful, where every citizen irrespective of the size of their pocket or the tribe they are born into is enabled to reach their full potential.

Akomfrah and Ato Sackey’s main problem has been the non receipt of dues which Ben promised Akomfrah would be forthcoming from all our members once we saw Reform in the CPP. We are not happy about throwing money at ineffective leadership. There is an email trail, so if they issue any more falsehoods we shall publish the emails here for all to see why they have resorted to this approach

So once again to Akomfrah, Ato Sackey, Delle and your small clique of traditionalists let us make this clear: We won’t be diverted from our goal of speaking about Ghana, in a modern way, in a way that today’s electorate understand. Leadership is not about regurgitating the past, nor is about idolising dead heroes. It is about moving people forward, giving hope when all seems lost. It is about the future, not the past. We know you are passionate about the oldCPP. We also know that the old ways are not working. It is not just us saying it. Listen to some of those who wrote to us last week:

”I can't but agree with you on this subject. Your write-up on the hypocrisy of the NDC was a masterpiece. ………………. UNITE now or never. None of the splinter groups can win any elections,I must repeat, yet they are all decieving us pretenciously. Let them not waste our time if they are not prepared to unite. Leadership is not forced on the people, people elect the leader. They should all come together and go to congress to elect the REAL leader.

newCPP I urge you to work hard to unify all the splinter groups.

Good luck for all of US. AK

To Whom It May Concern:

“May God bless whoever had the wisdom to write on the subject above. That was a brilliant piece of statement. I pray that CPP wins the coming elections or, at worse, become the largest minority group rather than NDC. I will be glad to learn your agenda, and your visions forward so that I will know how I can help. Keep up the good work and may God bless the party”.

EH Atlanta, GA

”I read your article in response to the NDC's reaction to the incarceration of one of their MPs. I think you were very articulate in pointing out the ills of our society. Majority of Ghanaians agree with you and will support anyone ready to fix the stuff. I am a strong CPP sympathizer ….. but I am so disillusioned with the party as it is today and do not see it different from the NDC and NPP. I think the current leadership is "corrupt", visionless, outdated and lacking the exuberance that people expect from their political leaders. I have heard this from so many people. …..Let me remind you that many years ago, when the UGCC realized that with all their talented people, they needed a fresh person with vision, charisma and a peoples person they did not hesitate to invite Dr. Nkrumah to lead them.

Later on Nkrumah had to break away from them because they were "too slow" for his liking. That is what the CPP has become now. The party has to start looking for a real leader”

I do not know who you are, but I am sure you will get a lot of emails like mine and you have to see that as an opportunity to connect with people who will help to resurrect the CPP again. OA, Telephone supplied.

Now, Akomfrah, Ato Scakey, Delle, we know you all want to be presidential candidates, hence your string need to control everyone. There isn’t the time or the space here to give you more emails but we hope you can see from the above that there is a worldwide call to change the way we do things. There is a call for a new direction because the old ways are not working. More importantly, there are people in the party who are committed to its transformation and regret that you spend all your time attacking and criticising them. You spend your time attacking those in the party who want to modernise it instead of helping to fight our real enemies- corruption, lies, ignorance, tribalism, disease and poverty .

You have made our party irrelevant in today’s affairs. Somehow, you seem to think that by keeping quiet about national issues, when the time for elections come, you can elect one of your secret sect as the flag bearer of our party, who would, as in the past, go round the country shouting Nkrumah, Nkrumah, Nkrumah and then hey presto, Ghanaians would all vote for the CPP. Please give Ghanaians some respect!

As we said to Ato Sackey, the CPP North American chair, over the weekend, your heart may be in the right place, but you don’t understand today’s electorate, nor do you appear to have the tools to reach them. You speak a language which is only accessible to the converted when you are actually suppose to speak to the whole of Ghana.

You also don’t understand today’s political terrain- perhaps you have lived abroad for far too long. Let us remind you: The NPP have more than 50% of the vote. The NDC have more than 45%. Collectively we and our supporters have just around 5%. To overcome this you need a new message and a new way of doing things.

You seem to be so hurt by the politics of the 1950s and 1960s that you can’t seem to move forward. We believe it is possible to promote wealth creation and social justice, within the context of an uncompromising attitude to corruption and the defence of human rights. We think that all of us can work together, to make this happen. The old strategies won’t help us win an election. Ghanaians are looking for a morally and ethically sound political leadership, with a determination to unite the nation. The old divisions are dead. Let’s move on.

You also seem to want us to support the NDC when we all know that it was the NDC that picked up guns to remove the CPP government in 1981 and unleashed 20 years of terror on our people.

We shall reiterate here what we told you over the weekend.

• We are committed to the unity of CPP and PNC

• We support our 3 MPs

• We support the patriots,

• We are not a party

• We don’t support the NDC nor do we intend to work with them

• We are not part of the NPP. We will tell you why in our next release.

We are against extremism. We ask for dialogue, discussion and debate. Is this too much to ask? And we stand for REFORM, REVITALISATION AND RENIASSANCE OF THE CPP AND OF GHANA.

We ask for inclusion of all the party’s modernisers in the frontline of our party’s work. Our party has talented people like, Prof Akosa, Dr Nduom, Dr Nii Moi Thompson, Dr Antwi Danso, Mr Mike Eghan, General Erskine, Dr Duffour, Asuma Banda, Kwabena Darko, Dr Sarfo, Bright Akwetey, Kofi Coomson, Egbert Faible etc etc etc. These people are household names with demonstrable competence and could match any line up that the other parties present. With such a line up, we wonder why you always choose lightweight spokesmen and unpopular people to front our party. With your dictatorial emails to us over the weekend shall we conclude that you only select people who say, yes sir? Do you want our party to win an election at all? Or you are paid up agents of the party people know? The emails we have received from sympathisers over the past week show that if you change the people fronting the party there are many, many more people in Ghana and overseas who would join you in the fight against injustice, corruption, nepotism and tribalism which has plagued our nation.

When you do this, we will send you the money you have asked for. Until then, we will continue to speak directly to Ghanaians, even though we know, that being old men, you wont listen to us the youth. But remember, Freedom of speech is a God-given right. Aluta Continua.

K O Donkor, B Hayford, Alfred Bonney, Salifu Mahammadu, Mohammed I Kanda, A K Banda, P K Agyei, Samuel Donkor, Stephen Appiah, Mohammed Bashiru Otuo Serebour, Sefah Kena, Twum K Barimah, KK Painstil, S Braimah, S K Serebour KO Mensah, Abraham Gyasi, Nana Adarkwah Yiadom, Nana Ama Ntim,

For a new CPP for a new Ghana