Haruna Iddrisu
The Minority Leader and Member of Parliament (MP) for Tamale South Constituency, Haruna Iddrisu, has lamented the dearth of intelligence on the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the need to ‘monitor’ the movements of President Akufo-Addo.
The Minority Leader’s alleged statement on ‘snooping on the president,’ is reportedly captured on the leaked audio recording containing the chilling strategies the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) intends using for the 2020 elections, one being the kidnappings of family members of political opponents.
The contents of the tape have already landed NDC National Chairman, Samuel Ofosu-Ampofo, in hot waters.
Addressing NDC communicators in a post Ayawaso West Wuogon Constituency by-election meeting, the Minority Leader was allegedly captured on the leaked tape as saying “one of our major weaknesses today is poor intelligence on the NPP. Nana Akufo-Addo is going to South Africa, where is he going; what will he do? You can know if we relate well with people and respect people.”
It’s unknown what the NDC would do with such information but experts in intelligence have explained that it is anything but good.
He even referred to what happened when former President Kufuor brought gold medals.
He did not go into details but the suggestion is that some clandestine NDC activity took place.
On the tape, the Minority Leader confirmed that NDC vigilante group called Azorka Boys, formed by one of the party’s vice chairpersons, Sofo Azorka, were in the NDC candidate’s house during the by-election.
He queried the lack of discretion on the part of NDC members who give intelligence to the NPP. “Had the NDC members been discrete and not given intelligence to National Security operatives, all that the NPP would have had would only be suspicions and not confirmation,” he said.
Consistent Lies
The Minority Leader gave the party’s communicators lessons on communication strategies.
For instance, he told them to be consistent with whatever lies they put out in the public domain and avoid vacillation.
“We are lost in our communications strategy; I know there are people amongst you who are more experienced than I am, but I will share just my clean thoughts consistency.
“If you want to be credible you have to be consistent; the Dagombas have a proverb that says if you bet an animal for purposes of hunting with lies, you must lie to pluck that animal. You have to keep lying; you can’t pluck him with truth again,” he remarked.
“If you lie, you must lie; so consistency is important and chairman, you take note, like Ayawaso all of us, all of us – and I am just going to point out as our communication flaws – all of us departed from chairman’s principle to boycott Ayawaso because we are not consistent,” he added.
‘It Worked For Us’
The plan of the NDC worked out well for the Ayawaso West Wuogon by-election ‘project’, according to Haruna Iddrisu.
“The Chairman did not want any leakage and therefore was not definite about whether there were Azorka boys in the candidate’s house or not when he was giving instructions on the D-Day.
“Because he could not be definite that there are Azoka boys or somebody’s boys in the candidate’s house, if they were not privy to some information on what leadership came to do, he knows what instructions he gave me. Like I said, he is my leader: I obeyed the instruction, in executing it, I tarried, and it has worked to our good.”
By A.R. Gomda