In February 2023, when I had gone to Ghana on holiday, I happened to phone my friend who is an NDC member of parliament to alert him of my presence in Ghana.

We had a 35-minute convivial conversation.

Most of the conversation was centred on the then-upcoming NDC parliamentary primaries. His super rich, learned, and noble eldest sibling who had offered him a shoulder to cry on come rain or shine, had his son applied to contest the parliamentary primaries.

The incumbent NDC MP was unreasonably bitter and could not comprehend why his full sibling would allow his son to contest him for the same parliamentary seat on the same NDC ticket.

Much as I tried to persuade him to stand down for his brother’s son, he, the MP, having been in parliament since 2012, unshakingly stood his ground, saying, no!

I told him he was simply being silly and ungrateful. I recounted all the good things his brother had always done for him, and for the fact his brother encouraged him to stand for parliamentary election in that constituency in the first place.

That constituency was intentionally carved out of the Kumawu Sekyere constituency by Charlotte Osei’s Electoral Commission to help the NDC win it.

I warned him that competing with his brother’s son who was financially more resourced than him would not augur well for him.

By then, he had become the best buddy of NDC flagbearer contestant, John Dramani Mahama at the expense of his brother who was contesting John Mahama.

As I could not get anywhere trying to persuade him to step down for his brother’s son, since it was dangerous for both to contest for the same seat on the NDC ticket, I decided to call off the conversation as I had to attend to another important task.

The long and short of the story is that both lost the primaries to a third female candidate contesting the primaries. While the female contestant, Hajia Nasira Afrah pulled 211 votes, the MP’s brother’s son pulled 203 and the MP pulled 86.

If one of the same family members had pulled out, the other could easily have won the election. If the MP had listened to my wise counsel to him, most of the votes he got could have gone to his brother’s son to win the election.

However, as they were divided, none of them won but lost miserably to the female contestant.

It is said, “In unity we stand but in division we fall”. This is amplified in the bible In Mark 3:24 - “If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand”.

A similar thing is ominously awaiting NPP with Alan Kojo Kyerematen splitting from NPP to form his “Butterfly Party”.

When I check Modernghana.com’s opinion poll on who will win the presidential election 2024 in Ghana, Dr. Bawumia lags behind NDC presidential candidate John Dramani Mahama by a little over a thousand votes while Alan Kojo Kyerematen has a little over 3,000 votes.

Most of the people voting for Alan are the supporters of NPP.

If Alan had not stepped down, Dr. Bawumia could have beaten John Mahama in that opinion poll and probably been on the ground come the 7 December 2024 general elections.

What is the NPP learning from the incident that happened in the Sekyere Afram Plains NDC parliamentary primaries in 2023?

Those two members of the same family lost because of division.

I have reserved the detailed conversation, treating it as private. Nevertheless, I have been compelled to put out this sketchy one as a warning to the NPP. They had better resolve their differences or else, they should see themselves as in opposition long before the election starts on 7 December 2024.

A word to the wise is enough.