The ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) a week ago, on November 4, 2023, elected Vice President Dr Mahamudu Bawumia as the new leader and presidential candidate for the party.

This makes Dr Bawumia, the first person with a Northern ancestry and the first Muslim to lead the NPP, a party that has its roots in the National Liberation Movement, founded by an Asantehene.

The unprecedented fate, according to historian and lawyer, Yaw Anokye Frimpong, has hullabaloos that might cloud the leadership of the current vice president in the NPP.

Speaking in an interview with GhanaWeb, the historian noted that Ashantis by their tradition do not like being led by Northerners and that would be one of the challenges that would confront Dr Bawumia.

“First of all, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) rooted in the United Party tradition which comes from the National Liberation November founded in 1954, had never used anybody from the north as their leader. Always it would be an Akan leader with someone from the north following him.

“But for the first time in their own tradition, they have placed a Northerner on top and the reason why for me it is a big controversy is that, the National Liberation Movement as a political party was founded by the Asantehene, Sir Osei Agyemang Prempeh II at Manhyia through his linguist Baffour Osei Yaw Akoto.

"So, it means that the party is based on Ashanti tradition; and Ashanti tradition explicitly hates a northern leading them, to the point that in 1970/71 when Ashanti Kotoko won the Africa Cup of Nation for the first, the Kotoko captain was a Northern… he held the cup, when he got to the Asantehene, he was forced to give it to an Akan player to hand it to the Asantehene… that his their culture and their tradition and that also permeates their party,” he added.

The private legal practitioner also added that religion is a factor that might affect the leadership of the vice president.

“The second controversy that comes up is that because Christians are over 73 percent and Muslims are less than 23 percent, it has always been a matter of easiness, political expediency, to place a Christian at the top. Now Bawumia comes in as a Muslim and the first time that we are possibly making a Muslim a president,” he said.

“So, the question is that would NPP voters, especially in the Ashanti Region, vote for a Northerner? And the second question is that would Ghanaian voters accept a Muslim. This would make the 2024 choice something that would be very dicey for every Ghanaian,” he noted.

Listen to Anokye Frimpong’s remarks below:



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