Polling station and electoral areas coordinators of the New Patriotic Party in the Tamale central constituency have declared an indefinite boycott of all party activities including the upcoming limited voters registers exercise.
A statement from the executives of the party, explained the boycott was necessitated by the fact that both polling station and executives seemed to have been used and dumped immediately the NPP won power in the 2016 general elections.
According to the executives, although polling station and electoral areas coordinators in the Tamale central risked their lives for the party by defending and protecting the party at the grassroots during 2016 elections, the leadership of the NPP has since neglected them.
The executives at a media briefing also stated that they as executives went through various ordeals including physical attacks and insults on the grounds all in their attempt to protect the party at the local level. Upon all these, not even one person among us has gotten any appointment,” they claimed.
They alleged that several contracts numbering about 400 came from different ministries and departments into the region, but all these contracts had been shared among other executives and government appointees much to the neglect of the grassroots supporters of the NPP party in the region.
The aggrieved executives set Tuesday, April 9, 2019 for the start of their indefinite boycott and have indicated that they will not resume their functions until their demands have been met.
Read the full text bellow
A PRESS CONFAB UNDER THE AUSPICES OF NEW
PATRIOTIC PARTY POLLING STATION EXECUTIVES AND
ELECTORAL AREA COORDINATORS IN THE TAMALE
CENTRAL CONSTITUENCY
Ladies and Gentlemen of the press, Party Faithful, Our Hardworking
Polling Station Executives – herein gathered, Electoral Area Coordinators,
Ladies and Gentlemen; we call this press confab in order to have our
concerns as well as the intentions which we, as Polling Stations
Executives and Electoral Area Coordinators communicated to the general
public on one hand, and to sound a clear word of caution to the leadership
of our great NPP party, on another.
Our friends from the press, we are a constitutional body within the new
patriotic party. Our existence and role within the party is established by
Article 6 of the new patriotic party constitution. We are clothed with a
constitutional right to existence and our role in the party enshrined in
Article 6 as follows:
ARTICLE 6
STRUCTURE AND ORGANIZATION
- (a) The party is a national party and shall accordingly be structured
and operated on that basis.
(b) The constituency organization shall include the Electoral Area
which shall be next on the hierarchy to the Polling Station. The
polling station executives in each electoral area elect the Electoral
Area Coordinator who shall be a member in good standing for at
least two years.
(c) For the purposes of effective coordination and monitoring, where
the polling stations under as electoral area exceed ten (10), an
additional electoral Area may be created and a coordinator elected
accordingly
Ladies and gentlemen of the media, you can now appreciate that our body
is a guaranteed constitutional body which the framers of the constitution
thought it wise to recognize because the NPP is a grassroots party. Our
work towards the sustainability of the party and its programmes in the
various constituencies cannot be underestimated. It is with this knowledge
and a heavy heart that we wish to remind the NPP Regional and National
Executives that we play the following roles:
We are the local executives of the party; representing the party in
various capacities and function
We are responsible for scouting and identifying members of the
party at the grassroots who start their political journey through the
polling stations to serving in national offices. By this, both the
present and the future of the party rests on our shoulders.
We ensure that members of the party register During Nationwide
Voter Registration as well as during Limited Voter Registration
Exercises.
We monitor both Nationwide Registration and Voter Register
Exhibitions in our various localities.
During campaign, we embark on door to door campaign, selling the
party’s programmes to the electorate in their respective Electoral
Areas and homes.
Also, during national and local elections, we, Polling Station
Executives and Electoral Area Coordinators ensure that members of
the party as well as its sympathizers are persuaded out of their homes
and workplaces to vote the party’s interests, wherever they may find
themselves.
We police and protect the ballot while serving as polling agents
throughout the elections amidst all the threats and intimidation
associated with serving the NPP here, in this city.
We guarantee the party a comprehensive representation at the
polling station through voting, sorting, counting, collation and
transmission of results to the parity’s constituency and National
Collation centers.
These and many others are some of the roles and responsibilities of
the Electoral Area Coordinators, polling station executives, and the
grassroots of the party. These, we did aggressively in 2016 against
all odds. The verdict is the overwhelming victory the NPP got in the
2016 Presidential and Parliamentary Elections.
Press, it is appalling to observe that over the two year period since the
party benefited from the hard work of these grassroots people, our
complains and petitions to the Constituency and Regional Executives as
well as some government appointees have falling on deaf ears, leaving us
to suffer the same predicament as though we are still in opposition.
We feel neglected as a collective. The consequences of a neglect of such
an important organ of the party machinery can be deadly for a party that
needs to sit up against the opposition National Democratic Congress who
promise to match us boot for boot. We are not unaware of the over four
hundred projects received in the region under the Ghana Highway
Authority, Feeder Roads, Urban Roads, GETFUND, and the Ministry of
Special Initiative since we came to power. The question we ask is; where
are the projects and who are the beneficiaries?
All Polling Station Executives and Electoral Area Coordinators in the
Tamale Central Constituency deserve some respect and appreciation from
the party hierarchy for their hard work in risking their lives and the lives
of their spouses and dependents. By this, we collectively have resolved
not to participate in any party activities henceforth. We shall boycott the
impending Limited Voter Registration Exercise and all other party related
activities till we are dully recognized. WE ARE NOT FOOLS!
WE ARE FOOT SOLDIERS: NOT FOOLISH SOLDIERS
To our friends from the media, we want to thank you for being here.
Source:Diamondfmonline.com/ Alhassan Yakubu
