John Mahama
The opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) is sulking after losing the general election on Monday, December 7 to their rivals, the New Patriotic Party (NPP), for a consecutive time.
The NDC were defeated heavily as incumbent in 2016 and re-presented former President John Dramani Mahama to try and recapture power, but failed.
Even though the parliamentary contest was close, in the presidential election, the NPP flag bearer, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, secured a second tenure after he defeated Mr. Mahama again per the declaration of the Electoral Commission (EC) Chairperson, Jean Mensa.
President Akufo-Addo polled 6,730,587, representing 51.303%; while Mr. Mahama of polled 6,213,182, representing 47.359%.
No Acceptance
The NDC since the declaration of the results have been complaining that they were cheated even though they have not been able to provide evidence to back their claims.
“We reject the presidential elections as announced by the chair of the Electoral Commission in favour of the NPP presidential candidate,” said Haruna Iddrisu, NDC MP for Tamale South in the Northern Region who doubles as the Minority Leader in Parliament.
Press Conference
He said at a press conference a few hours after the declaration of the results that the NDC had reservations about the conduct of the polls, and served notice that the party would also fiercely resist “the blatant effort even to deny us a parliamentary majority.”
The Minority Leader thinks the declaration of the results is an ‘attack’ on Ghana’s democracy, since he said the NDC thought the results, as announced by the EC boss, who is the Returning Officer of the presidential election, did not reflect the actual outcome of the poll.
“This evening Ghana’s democracy has come under severe attack and needs some rescue urgently. If not rescued, these attacks would fester and grow into future elections and that would disfigure our track record as a true democratic nation,” he claimed.
Mr. Iddrisu said “as a party, we have had extensive consultations and detailed analysis of the outcome of the elections as announced by Jean Mensa, the EC Chairperson,” adding “we have come to only one irresistible conclusion that it is a flawed discredited election and therefore we reject the presidential result without any reservation.”
He disclosed that the NDC presidential candidate, ex-President Mahama had sent a petition to the commission to express his concerns over the collation of results prior to the declaration, but stated that the said petition was treated with contempt.
By Ernest Kofi Adu