… NPP Chair tells listeners in Kumasi

Mr. Owusu Kodua, Nsuta-Kwamang constituency chairman of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), in the Ashanti Region, and a close pal of Nana Akufo Addo, has minced no words in placing the NPP’s defeat in the 2008 elections at the doorsteps of former President John Agyekum Kufuor.

According to Mr. Owusu Kodua, ex- President Kufuor committed some serious blunders at the tail end of his administration that eventually dug the grave of the party in the election.

To buttress his point, he said Mr. Kufuor failed to disburse some 3,000 taxis under the Medium and Small Scale Loans Centre (MASLOC) programme, whilst some tractors bought to be disbursed to farmers to win their support, were also not given out.

Additionally, Mr. Owusu was convinced that Mr. Kufuor’s failure to support Nana Addo, because his preferred choice, Alan Kyerematen, did not win the presidential primary of the NPP, which saw Nana Addo becoming the party’s flagbearer, was another major contributing factor to the party’s defeat.

Mr. OwusuKodua, who could not hide his frustration at the alleged involvement of MrKufuor in the defeat of the NPP on Boss FM’s ‘Issues on Board’ programme on Thursday, March 25, this year, added that some policy decisions implemented at the tail end of the Kufour administration, made the NPP lose the elections.

Mr. OwusuKodua was on the programme with his colleague Bosomtwe NPP constituency chairman, Bernard AntwiBoasiako, and BrogyaGyamfi and Joseph Yamin, an activist of the NPP and Regional Secretary of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) respectively.

The panellists were discussing issues that possibly caused the NPP’s defeat in the 2008 general elections, as suggested by the programme host, J. K. OwusuBoakyea.k.aAlbito.

Mr. OwusuKodua, who confirmed these statements to The Chronicle, explained that he was compelled to come out the way he did, because some panellists on the show had made comments that suggested that Nana Addo was a failure.

He said some of the panellists went to the extent of saying that Nana Addo did not have a campaign strategy, and was only enjoying a fanfare with musicians, which caused his defeat in the 2008 elections.

In reaction to these comments, however, he noted that he then set the records straight by pointing to them who really was to blame for the NNP’s defeat.

Additionally, he attributed the NPP’s inability to win the 2008 general elections to Kufuor’s supposed failure to tour the length and breadth of the country with then candidate Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.

The Bosomtwe constituency chairman, Bernard AntwiBoasiako, also a panellist, was said to have been alarmed at the comments of his colleagues, and distanced himself from the allegations, since, according to him, Mr. OwusuKodua’s allegations were not based on any element of truth and fact.

He, however, cautioned his colleague that as an opposition party struggling to come to power, that was not the time for the blame game, notwithstanding the fact that the radio station was not the appropriate forum to make these wild allegations.

The NDC Regional Secretary was also compelled by circumstances to caution the NPP and some of its members, from bastardisingKufuor, since he believes he was an asset to the party, stressing that any attempt to sideline the former President from the party, could spell the NPP’s doom.