Stephen Ayesu Ntim has been elected the chairman of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) at the party’s annual national delegates’ conference in Accra.
Ntim received 4,014 votes (72.76% of the vote), as against his main contender, Stephen Asamoah Boateng, who garnered 1,010 votes (18.31%).
George Kwabena Abankwah-Yeboah had 294 votes (5.33%), Professor Christopher Ameyaw-Akumfi had 101 (1.83%) and Gifty Asantewaa Ayeh (aka Daavi Ama) won 44 (0.8%). Sammy Crabbe received 32 votes (0.58%) and Akwasi Osei-Adjei had 20 (0.36%).
For the general secretary position, Justin Kodua Frimpong garnered 2,837 votes to beat the incumbent candidate, John Boadu, who had 2,524.
Iddrisu Musah (aka Musah Superior) came third with 104 votes, Frederick Opare-Ansah had 50 and Ramseyer Agyeman-Prempeh had eight. Interestingly, Charles Bissue, who pulled out of the general secretary race on 13 July, secured 12 votes.
“20 years in the wilderness”
In his acceptance speech, the new NPP national chairman said, “The new national executive will work assiduously for the party to win Election 2024 in conjunction with our Members of Parliament and our members in the diaspora. I’m grateful to my supporters and the party for giving me a memorable 64th birthday present.”
Ntim added, “Finally, it’s been 20 long years of wandering in the wilderness before clinching this position as national chairman of the New Patriotic Party and I assure you that I’m going to cherish the chairmanship position, I will value the chairmanship position.
“And I will make sure that it will be a unique position that will remain enviable for anybody to aspire [to] …”
Before the elections, some party stalwarts called on delegates to elect only leaders who could help the NPP “break the eight”.
“Holistic duty”
Earlier, President Nana Akufo-Addo had similarly called on delegates to elect executives who can help the NPP remain in power after the 2024 general election.
Addressing the party at the national delegates’ conference in Accra, the president said unity will be key to break the eight. As such, the new executives should be able to hold the party together in the lead-up to the next election, he said.
“It’s our historic duty to maintain the NPP in office under a new candidate and under a new leader,” Akufo-Addo told the delegates at the Accra Sports Stadium.
“An important step towards that victory is the work we’re going to do today,” said Akufo-Addo, before the delegates cast their vote. “Let’s make sure that we elect men and women who can hold us together and enable us to work together to be able to surmount our mantra ‘Breaking the Eight’.”
He declared: “We shall break the eight in 2024.”
The former president John Kufuor also advised delegates to choose competent leaders to lead the party to win the 2024 elections.
Kufuor also called on the NPP delegates to elect national executives who can lead the party to regain the confidence of Ghanaians.
“Even as we meet to pick a new crop of leaders to lead us forward … I want to appeal to all of us, that let us from now select national executives of the party not on great talk, but on careful examination,” Kufuor told delegates, in a pre-recorded message.
“To find out the sort of leadership that will enable us regain the confidence of the people of Ghana and let us show true respect to the idea, the vision that true sovereignty is from the people,” he said.
“When we do that, then our definition of democracy will conform with the idea, eloquently expressed as government of, for and by the people. When we do that, I tell you, most of them will rally with us and follow the party in … governance.”
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