A flagbearer of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Dr. Owusu Afriyie Akoto, has told polling station executives and electoral area coordinators that he will make them the frontliners of his campaign and properly resource them to be able to win power in the general elections next year.
What he demands from them is hard work and commitment to the call to break the eight.
According to him, the party cannot continue to look on when its frontline workers, popularly known as grassroots party faithful, continue to wallow in abject poverty and expect them to run a vibrant campaign machinery aimed at increasing the votes the party obtained in the 2020 general elections.
He said while he will resource the Polling Station Executives and Electoral Area Coordinators from now to the day the 2024 general elections would be held when he wins the party’s flagbearer position, he will equally find sustainable ways of improving on their living standards going forward.
“We nearly lost election 2020 because of neglect of Polling station and Electoral Area Coordinators. Because of this, there was so much apathy among the party faithful. Morale was therefore down and our people at the grassroots found it very difficult to go and propagate the good news of the party. What was the situation in 2016? In 2016, because the base (referring to Polling Station Executives and Electoral Area Coordinators) of the party was properly energized, we won convincingly, with our the Presidential Candidate, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, beating then President John Dramani Mahama, over one million votes to become the President of the Republic. So, it is evidenced that a well-resourced Polling Station Executives and Area Coordinators will ensure our victory in 2024”, he noted.
Dr. Akoto made this observation when he mounted a spirited campaign tour that took him to parts of the Volta and Eastern Regions last week. Among the areas visited in the Volta Region include Anlo, Keta, Akatsi North, Afadjato South, and Ho Central constituencies. In the Eastern Region, Dr. Akoto visited the New Juaben South, Akim Oda, and Asene-Akroso-Manso constituencies.
Commenting further, Dr. Akoto said he had to resign from his Ministerial position and compete in the party’s upcoming flagbearership race, underscoring that a win for him will ensure that he carries out reforms that will prioritize the welfare of the Polling Station Executives and Electoral Area Coordinators as well as Constituency Executives.
He told the party faithful that his strategy christened ‘Linking party to Government’ would be vigorously pursued, believing that is the best sustainable means of effectively managing the party at all levels and ensuring that the welfare of the party members are properly catered for.
The ‘Linking party to Government’ strategy, he observed, includes setting up a chain of party-owned businesses at national, regional, and constituency levels.
These party-owned companies would be managed by a holding company that will ensure that party members are gainfully employed the businesses, citing key examples in Taiwan where Kuomintang (KMT) or Nationalist Party of Taiwan amassed a vast business empire of banks, investment companies, petrochemical firms, and television and radio stations to assist in managing the party.
He also cited the ANC party in South Africa which also has Chancellor House Holdings, a private company managing its business empire including and mining and other assets and generating wealth through prudent and viable investment opportunities for Shareholders. Chancellor House Holding does not invest companies that tender for any work or conduct procurement directly or indirectly with any RSA’s National, Provincial and Local Government spheres, Government Agencies and State Owned Entities.
A classical example, he also cited, is the Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF), a political party that owns Crystal Ventures, a holding company that has investments in everything from furniture to finance. It owns the country’s biggest milk processor, its finest coffee shops, and some of its priciest real estate.
Crystal Ventures contractors are building Kigali’s roads. The company is reckoned to have to have some US$ 500 million of assets.
These, but few examples, Dr. Akoto noted will be replicated to ensure sustainable means of managing the UP tradition, stressing that when well implemented, it will go a long way to ending the sufferings of the party members.
“The companies that I will set up at each level of our party will employ party members. By so doing, it will provide sustainable means of resourcing you and your sufferings or plight will be a thing of the past”, he stressed.
