26/04/2023
WE WILL REBEL AND SEIZE POWER IF YOU DO NOT HAND OVER AFTER LOSING AT POLLING STATIONS: RESPONSE TO THE "WE WILL NEVER HAND OVER POWER" NPP THREAT
On April 8, 2023, Bryan Acheampong of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) threatened that his party would never hand over power after the 2024 election and that it would employ every means necessary to hold on to power. This "we will never hand over power" threat has become a refrain on the lips of NPP leaders. For instance, Lord Commey and Nana Addo Dankwa Akuffo-Addo have made similar threats.
When these threats are related to how Bryan Acheampong deployed armed thugs to shoot and beat people to aid the NPP in winning the 2019 Ayawaso West Wougon by-election, how the NPP benefited from voter suppression schemes in opposition strongholds spearheaded by the military during the 2020 Voter Registration exercise, how military men were used to shoot and kill eight unarmed sympathizers of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) to guarantee an NPP advantage in the 2020 Election, and how the Electoral Commission kept changing already declared presidential results in the 2020 election, then one gets a fair idea of the "end-justifies-the-means" measures the NPP is putting in place to win the 2024 election.
The NPP insists there is nothing wrong with Bryan's threat. The same NPP is demanding that Mahama should be arrested for utterances they claim are similar to what Bryan said. These positions are contradictory and amount to approbating and reprobating. Only people who are fixated on winning elections through undemocratic means or implementing the "end-justifies-the-means" strategy for winning an election would reason that a "we will never hand over power" threat is acceptable in a democracy or whitewash such a threat that it was made in a certain context. There is no context that justifies a "we will never hand over power" threat in any democracy; particularly when an NPP President has appointed known NPP activists to referee the 2024 election.
The NPP is in cahoots with the Electoral Commission and engineering an unfair electoral process to emerge as winners in the 2024 Election. This is contrary to Ghana's Electoral Laws, which mandate the Electoral Commission to create an even playing field for all contestants and declare the candidate who the majority of Ghanaians vote for as the winner. Coming out in this foolhardy manner to declare that they will never hand over indicates that they are certain that the measures they are putting in place will guarantee them victory. This is why they are insisting that they will not be handing over even before the election is conducted and defiantly defending their threat in the face of widespread condemnation.
After collapsing Ghana's economy through reckless borrowing and wasteful spending, and bastardizing state institutions such as the Electoral Commission and Judiciary by packing them with known NPP activists, the NPP's threat that they will never hand over power must awaken a resolve in all Ghanaians who do not support them to stand up against them. We must prevent them from skewing the electoral process in their favor by for instance insisting on using only Ghana card as requirement for registering to vote, and be ready to take on armed thugs or military personnel whom they may rely on to cheat in the 2024 election. We have to be outraged by the undemocratic tactics that the NPP is scheming to perpetuate themselves in power, and we must stop them.
If you feel strongly that Ghana needs a change in government from the NPP to NDC, as former UT Boss Prince Kofi Amoabeng recently stated, then the NPP's threat that they will never hand over should motivate you to join forces with like-minded Ghanaians to take the necessary actions to prevent then from imposing themselves on us.
The battle line is drawn!
PAPA KWASI AKWETEY
NATIONALISTS MOVEMENT CONVENER
+233(0)59-55-191-55
ISSUED: APRIL 12, 2023
