For the New Patriotic Party (NPP), there seems to be no end to controversy; the party has been thrown into a state of disarray and is going through one of the most difficult times in its history.
While the leadership of the party has tried its best to steady the ship, it has also significantly contributed to the mess the party finds itself in.
The post-Nana Addo era of the NPP is beginning to look even more calamitous than anticipated. Events unfolding are a clear indication that the party has not learnt critical lessons from the 2024 election defeat, and self-centred personalities are bent on sacrificing the good of the party for their selfish interests.
There are sources who say the top brass of the NPP executives are determined to make Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia the flagbearer again, although, Dr. Bawumia may not command the respect and popularity required to secure electoral victory. Some say the NPP national executives are in the bosom of Dr. Bawumia, and decisions like this give credence to such suspicions.
The January 2026 presidential primary plan exposes a leadership that is keener on self-preservation than on party progress and unity. The current crop of party leaders is arguably the most unpopular and uninspiring. Their attempt to breach the long-held bottom-up approach to internal party elections may spell doom for themselves, and the party as people perceive it as an attempt to foist Dr. Bawumia on the party and preserve their positions.
The grumbling from the party’s grassroots should send signals to the party’s National Executive Committee and National Council; that in the end they may court more rancor and disaffection among their party faithful.
The argument that the move is to quell the leadership struggle raises serious concerns about the leadership mettle of the executives, and the efficiency of the systems that have been established by the party. Why has the NPP, in Opposition and without a flagbearer, suddenly lost its direction that it urgently requires a presidential candidate to calm the waters? Truth is, even with a presidential candidate, the National Executives should be able to exercise their authority unhindered. This is an emerging culture that should be nipped in the bud; that without a presidential candidate, the National Executives of the party cannot exercise legitimate authority.
Indeed, it is a culture that emerged in the era of Nana Addo, who decided to undermine the authority of the National Executives and instituted a culture of brazen disregard for Paul Afoko and Kwabena Agyapong as National Chairman and General Secretary respectively. Sadly, other National Executives who should have stood their ground, with the exception of Sammy Crabbe, supported Nana Addo in that sordid adventure of running the NPP with his family and friends, leading to the utter contempt with which the National Executives are treated today. It is the same culture of family and friends, which Paul Afoko had fiercely resisted, that Nana Addo sent into government, and led to a monumental failure in governance and a disastrous outcome in Election 2024
Today, the leadership crisis in the Party is not one that can easily be dismissed with the proposed presidential primary. For many, it exposes the extent of poor leadership that has plagued the Party since the Akufo Addo era when power was wrestled from the National Executives in the most scandalous manner and thrown to the wolves.
Some people in the Party celebrated the ostracization of Paul Afoko, Kwabena Agyapong and Sammy Crabbe in a politically blinding manner. And, they fail to recognize that the NPP has refused to face the hard realities, and live by its motto ‘Development in Freedom’; else why would a party that was founded on the tenets of freedom, free speech and rule of law, stifle people’s right to express freely their wishes save for one person, Kennedy Agyapong, who can speak out boldly against party ills, and no one dares invite him to any Disciplinary Committee.
Because the party won elections in 2016 following the suspension, many have assumed that it was a popular decision forgetting that Ghanaians were smarting under difficult economic challenges and had until a few months before the election endured a crippling and sweltering energy crisis.
The cracks, thereafter, have never been mended, and deep rifts still exists in the party; rifts that will hurt the party for years to come unless there is credible reconciliation. Many people hold bitterness, and genuine efforts to unite the party have never been made.
In a recent interview in the media, former general Secretary of the NPP, John Boadu talked about the recall of Kwabena Agyapong, and why Paul Afoko has not been recalled into the party. He justified the failure of the Party to recall Afoko on the basis that he had not written to the Party to request to be recalled. This excuse is lame, and another evidence of the self-serving attitude of some personalities in the Party. Suddenly, John Boadu, who sources say is eying the Party’s National Chairman position is making Paul Afoko a subject of his campaign because some people have called for the return of Paul Afoko to lead the Party as National Chairman.
But how do you expect a person who genuinely felt he was demonized by the Party and treated in the most demeaning manner, to write to the party to be recalled? How do you expect someone who was unfairly undermined by Nana Addo, and scandalised with lies, to reach out to the party to be recalled?
John Boadu has no qualms with the Party making approaches to Alan Kyeremanten, who resigned from the party for the second time, and together with his lieutenants such as Hopeson Adorye campaigned viciously against the Party in the 2024 election; yet, he believes Paul Afoko should rather write to the Party so that the hawks in the Party can demonise and humiliate him, like they did some years ago, ostensibly because maybe, he sees Paul Afoko as a threat to his National Chairmanship ambition.
John Boadu may have exposed a sinister plot to embarrass Paul Afoko should he ever make the mistake of writing to the Party for readmission when he cheekily retorted that as for Afoko, his membership of the party was even revoked.
It is on record that Kwabena Agyapong has never expressed any remorse for events that led to his suspension. Indeed, he has consistently condemned the suspension and criticized the party’s leadership for the decision. Paul Afoko has been quiet since the court decision that revoked his party membership.
John Boadu touts the decision to request letters as if it was a master stroke that douses any suspicion of tribalism – how farcical! One may argue that the decision to request letters was made only to provide a basis for adjudication and separation so that Mr. Agyapong could be separated from Mr. Afoko on whatever basis the hawks and wolves in the party deemed fit. Discernibly, it may have been an approach to keep Afoko out of the party for the parochial political interest of some people in the party, but that was not smart as it rather provides a basis for tribal interpretations into the decision.
Today, the spineless National Executive Committee and National Council of the party are products of the reckless undermining and suspension of Paul Afoko, Sammy Crabbe and Kwabena Agyapong in 2015.
And not even the proposed January 2026 presidential primary may mend the rifts created by the callous decision.
By Sam Dean
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