NPP to embark on membership registration drive
The ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) will this month, September, start a nationwide mass registration exercise of its members.
The registration, which will be done at various polling stations across the country is to enable the party to have complete data of its members.
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The General Secretary of the party, John Boadu at a press conference at the head office of the party in Accra on Friday, September 10, 2021, said the exercise will enable the party to know the over six million people that voted for the party in its last election in 2020.
He said the party has so far distributed 40,000 registers to all the polling stations where the exercise will take place.
He said the exercise will last for 20 days and encouraged all party members to go to their polling stations to register.
Mr. Boadu said President Akufo-Addo will go to his polling station to take part in the exercise, urging all party leaders and bigwigs to join it in order to encourage all members.
Why registration?
He explained that the data that will be collected during the registration exercise will not be used to conduct any election, hence cautioning polling station executives not to deny any party person the opportunity to register.
For Mr Boadu, even people who are non-members of the party but would want to join the party should be given the opportunity to register. He was, however, quick to add that non-members of the party who will register will be monitored for some time before any further decision on them would be taken.
He explained that after the polling station registration, the party will also open a constituency register where details collected from the polling station registration will be collated and entered for further processing at the party’s headquarters.
He said the party has distributed registers to all the 275 constituencies in the country, stressing that those who will be registered will become ambassadors of the party, communicating the works of the government.
Presidential candidate
The NPP General Secretary also commended party members for their compliance with the party’s code of conduct concerning campaigning for presidential aspirants in the party.
He said early this year, activities about people campaigning for some individuals eying the presidential candidate slot of the party became rife which the party’s leadership acted swiftly to stop.
Mr Boadu explained that the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the party had to come out with the code of conduct directive to ensure that the right procedures, regarding elections of presidential candidate for the party was followed.
He said the party’s leadership will open nomination for presidential aspirants at the right time, adding that “the NPP welcomes competition.”
Delegate conference
He also commended the party members for comporting themselves during its nationwide constituency delegate conference which ended recently.
He said the party will hold its regional delegate conference in October, starting with Savanna region and ending with the Greater Accra Region.
Do or die
Mr Boadu also reacted to the recent “Do or Die” comment by former President John Dramani Mahama, saying that Mr Mahama made the comment out of desperation and frustration.
For him, the party will not waste time listening to the various explanations Mr Mahama has been giving to his inflammatory ‘do or die’ comment.
He said Mr Mahama is desperate and has to resort to the use of such inflammatory language because he has no blueprint to match the level of development ongoing in the country.
"It is a distasteful comment that does not belong in our fast-maturing democracy. We note that John Mahama stubbornly refuses to retract, rather he's seeking refuge in semantics and grammar, struggling to explain the impossibility," Mr Boadu said.
Former President Mahama in his recent ‘Thank you’ tour in the Bono East region charged party supporters of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) to treat the 2024 election as a “do or die” at the polling station to ensure that the party was not cheated.
The ‘do or die’ comment has since gone viral, attracting condemnation from the ruling NPP whilst members of his party have been defending the comment.
For Mr Boadu, Mr Mahama’s ‘do or die’ comment has exposed his “desperation and incompetence.”
He said instead of Mr Mahama encouraging what he (Boadu) perceives as violence tactics towards the 2024 elections, he should rather invest in training NDC’s members to man the various polling centres as well as building facilities to help the party to collect its votes.
He said Mr Mahama had demonstrated in the last two elections which have been held in the country that he lacked the capacity to put in the needed facilities to enable his party to collate its own votes independently.
