Samuel Ofosu-Ampofo
Samuel Ofosu-Ampofo, Director of Elections of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), has advised party members to adopt “the Jehovah Witness and trotro mates theories” to ensure effective party organisation to recapture power in the 2020 polls.
He said, “Our approach to party organisation must be based on the Jehovah witness’ principle of making sure that we knock doors, talk to people, be consistent with our messages, be focused and results-oriented,” adding, “Once we adopt that theory, we will make headway.”
He further explained, “The theory of trotro mates and passenger philosophy is, the mates are focused on the passengers, determined to get them to board their vehicles. They run to help the passengers carry their luggage onto the vehicle. So once we focus on the people, they get to know that we are concerned about their welfare; that is the bottom line of organisation; they will relate very well to us.”
Mr Ofosu-Ampofo was speaking in an interview with the Ghana News Agency in Tamale over the weekend after facilitating a training organised by the Ghana Institute of Social Democracy (GISD), the NDC’s school located in the Northern Region, for the party’s communication team.
About 320 participated in the two-day training, which focused on political leadership, political communication and party leadership, to among other things, build the capacity of members of the party to help its re-organization drive.
Mr Ofosu-Ampofo said the party should adopt a bottom-up approach to writing its manifesto – go to the grassroots, sample their opinions to ensure that the manifesto reflects the wishes and aspirations of the people.
He said the party was working to ensure that it did not restrict its congresses to only elections, but also to debate policy issues and agree on policy positions that the party wants to adopt to reflect the aspirations of the people.
He advised party members not to discard local knowledge saying, “When you go to the communities to work, do not think that you are the organiser and so you know everything; get down with the people, and find out their challenges to help fulfil their aspirations.”
Mr Ofosu-Ampofo also spoke about the performance of the one-year old government of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), describing it as abysmal, adding, it was “a walking contradiction” as it was doing the exact opposite of what it promised the people.
Peter Boamah Otokunor, Registrar of GISD and Deputy Director of Research of the NDC, said the party was expanding the training to cover more members and topics to help in its re-organisation drive to recapture power in 2020.