Mr Ivor Kobina Greenstreet, the Flagbearer of the Convention People’s Party (CPP) has urged persons with physical disability to use the wheelchair to facilitate their mobility towards engaging in activities that would enhance their total well-being.

A statement issued by the CPP, and copied to the Ghana News Agency, on Monday said Mr Greenstreet made the remarks at a rally, attended mainly by the persons with disabilities, in Lawra in the Upper West Region.

Mr Greenstreet’s campaign message, titled, The New Testament, which translates as “Mwini Sumbo” in Walla and Dagaare, and as “Apam Fofor?” in Twi, was explained to them as representing the new dawn of Ghanaian Politics.

“In this world no one knows the circumstances of tomorrow,” the statement quoted Mr Greenstreet as saying. “What is important is the purity of your heart and desires.

“What is necessary is your positive, forward looking thoughts. What is noble is your courage, sincerity, truthfulness, love for others and the willingness to serve your nation as well as the readiness to sacrifice.”

The statement said Mr Greenstreet told the people that the CPP team would not to relent in their efforts to engage the whole of Ghana.

“But our success would depend on your acceptance of the challenge to become an organiser and a mobiliser of people for the cause, which has brought us here today,” he said.

Mr Greenstreet said; “There is too much injustice in our society. There is too much unfairness and inconsistencies. We owe it a duty to ourselves to change the status quo.

“The tendency where we allow culprits to get away with their crimes while the innocent suffer with some languishing in jail would be tackled head on under the “Apam Fofor?” leadership of the CPP.”

Incidentally, Mr Greenstreet was given an opportunity to address a function nearby, which was organised by the Association of Hairdressers, and had as the guest of honour, Mr Paschal Dery, the Lawra District Chief Executive, who was in crutches as a result some recent health challenges,.

Mr Greenstreet, the first man in a wheelchair to join the race towards becoming Ghana’s President, complained about the disrespect that was often shown to persons with disabilities in Ghana.

“From our homes and families, to our schools and hospitals or within governmental structures we are disrespected because they don’t care about us,” he said.

This is our chance to prove to all and sundry that we are able despite the challenges we live with.”

He charged the group to be hopeful and press on the best way they could.

Additionally, he said, no one would seek their interests if they failed to fight for themselves.

The CPP Presidential Campaign took a new twist when the team visited the Prison grounds at Lawra; where Kwame Nkrumah was detained upon the arrest of the Big Six, following the 1948 disturbances, the statement said.

The statement said the actual structure that Nkrumah was kept in was believed to have been pulled down by some aggressive civil servant who only regretted the action after he was told what the building represented.

It said the tour took the CPP Campaign Team to from Wa to Lawra, Nandom and the Gonja West.

It said at the Prison grounds, the emotionally charged Mr Greenstreet, condemned the poor state of our prisons as well as the demotivating conditions of service under which personnel of the Prisons Service operated.

Recounting the occurrences which led to the arrest and detention of Osagyefo, Professor Edmund Delle, the CPP Chairman, said the political struggles and the success that followed never come about without sacrifice.

He said: “Osagyefo and his compatriots suffered and paid the price of imprisonment because of the path they had chosen to liberate their people from the shackles of colonialism and imperial dictatorship of dehumanisation.”

“Greenstreet, like Nkrumah, had overcome many obstacles such as being in a wheel chair as a result of a near fatal car accident to become the Presidential Candidate of the CPP. I have survived 11 crashes, including one plane crash myself but I am still alive.”

He explained that it was God’s own plan and purpose that they could go through all that and be alive today.