Why are Presidential debates important in an election year? If you were to direct this poser at Senator John Forbes Kerry, the Democratic candidate in the November 2 Presidential elections in the United States of America his answer would be an emphatic yes.

And why is that? After failing to gain what political commentators call a ?bounce? after his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in August, advisors of the 4-term Senator from Massachusetts staked the future of his Presidential campaign on the outcome of last Thursday?s Presidential Debate.

Kerry did very well and in a poll conducted by the authoritative Gallup company he scored 53 percent as against 38 percent by incumbent President George Walker Bush.

?Our campaign now has some momentum behind it? was the reaction of the Kerry campaign after the Gallup and other opinion polls showed their candidate outscored President Bush in the debate that was based solely on Foreign Policy. Two more debates are slated for October 8th and October 13th. The Vice-Presidential debate was held in Cleveland Tuesday this week.

Following this trajectory can we safely say that a presidential debate plays a big role in determining the stakes in an election? Of cause we can.

A SHINING EXAMPLE

The first ever Presidential debate held in Ghana was in 2000 just before the crucial Presidential elections. It was a very salutary occasion for Ghana in the sense that it made the accountability component of our Democracy very relevant to the electorate. As I watched the debate and watched the six Presidential candidates being subjected to rigorous and vigorous line of questioning I came away from that experience with a high degree of confidence in our democratic experiment.

In terms of style and substance, which characteristically define debates, most Ghanaians voted Goosie Tanoh and Edward Mahama candidates of the National Reform Party (NRP) and the People?s National Congress (PNC) as the run-away winners. These two candidates stood out from the caboodle with very well articulated positions about the economy, health care, education, the environment, employment, education etc.

At the end of the debate, most people agreed Goosie Tanoh won the contest with Mahama right at his heels. Candidate John Kufuor wasn?t impressive but came away with a pass mark. Most people concluded that the candidate of the United Ghana Movement (UGM) spoke well but basically failed to connect with the electorate. Many found his presentation very condescending and his body language didn?t help him either.

Dan Lartey was his vintage self. He scored high marks on style but failed to connect with his much-trumped Domestication policy.

Professor George Hagan of the Convention People?s Party (CPP) was also not very impressive as he was when I interviewed him weeks before the election. The one person who lost big time during the debate was the Presidential candidate of the National Democratic Congress (NDC). For reasons none but his campaign could fathom Professor John Evans Atta-Mills failed to show. To the mind of Ghanaians he lost the debate for his no-show. Refusing to miss out on the maiden, nationally televised debate featuring all the Presidential candidates for whatever reason was not smart at all and probably caused him the Presidency. Any display of arrogance on the part of incumbency perceived or not hurts one person-the incumbent. And that is a reality in modern politics.

The Mills press conference organized as a Meet the Press encounter by the Campaign to steal the thunder from the debate received a lot of media attention and earned the campaign some leverage in the race.

In an unscientific poll I conducted after the debate it was obvious Goosie won the debate but the problem they (respondents) had with Goosie was not about his electability. People who became enamored with the Reform candidate after the debate felt his little known party did not have the organizational acumen and financial muscle to stage an upset in the elections. Another problem that militated against the Goosie?s presidential ambitions was the unhidden fact that Ghanaians felt they could better trust the future of the country in the hands of the two major political traditions-the Nkrumaists and the Danquah-Busiasts.

The New Patriotic Party (NPP) did not stake their Presidential campaign on the outcome of the debate because they knew their candidate was not an exceptional public speaker. In fact all through the campaign the NPP and its candidate failed to level with the electorate on the alternative programmes they intended to prosecute if they were given the mandate by the people.

While most people were disenchanted with 20 years of the same faces, same policies et al they also did not have enough information about the other candidates to make an informed choice during the elections.

Based on the above how did the NPP manage to cast its candidate as the ideal person for the job of President?

That is for next week.