Nana Ohene Ntow, a former General Secretary of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), has narrated the supposed events that led to the selection of Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia, as the running mate of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo prior to the 2008 elections.

Speaking in an Adom TV interview monitored by GhanaWeb, Ohene Ntow said that the party had to come to a compromise after the intervention of former President John Agyekum Kufuor for Bawumia, who was not a member of the NPP, to become the running mate of Akufo-Addo.

According to him, the opposition to Bawumia as the running mate of Akufo-Addo was because he was not a card-bearing member of the NPP and had not served the mandatory five years needed for a person to run for a position in the party at the time.

“After the selection of Akufo-Addo as the flagbearer of the NDC in 2006, his first choice as running mate was rejected by the national council of the party. The national council proposed another person but Akufo-Addo did not accept, we struggled over it but it did not work.

“Then Akufo-Addo brought Alhaji Dr Bawumia and the first reaction of the council was ‘but this person is not a party member, why should we make him running mate?’. That day there was a commotion at the Alisa Hotel.

“It took former President John Agyekum Kufuor's interventions for the issue to be resolved. Kufuor advised that Akufo-Addo should be allowed to choose the person he thinks he can work with. He advised that the party should come to a compromise and give Bawumia a concession by scrapping the five years he needs to serve as a number of the NPP before he can be running mate or presidential candidate of the party,” he said in Twi.

Nana Ohene Ntow added that as general secretary of the NPP at the time, he was the one who signed the membership card for Dr. Bawumia.

Watch the interview below:





IB/WA