If the National Democratic Congress's (NDC) 2019 presidential primary results are any indication, then former president John Dramani Mahama, who is running for re-election to lead the party in the 2024 general election, is in a strong position to win the race for the flagbearership.
Following the withdrawal of former Finance Minister Dr. Kwabena Duffuor from the race, former Chief Executive of the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly Kojo Bonsu will be the only candidate running against former President Mahama, who represented the NDC in the 2012, 2016, and 2020 presidential elections.
At a press conference conducted at his Institute of Fiscal Studies at the University of Ghana, Dr. Duffuor announced his intention to withdraw from the presidential primary.
At a news conference held at his Institute of Fiscal Studies in Accra's Airport Residential neighborhood last evening, Dr. Duffuor declared his intention to withdraw from the presidential primary.
He mentioned the polls' lack of transparency and impartiality as his justifications.
After winning the general election in 2012 and losing the presidential elections in 2016 and 2020, Mr. Mahama will run for president a third time, provided the party's delegates give him the go-ahead.
Statistics
In the party's 2019 presidential primary, Mr. Mahama received an overwhelming 213,487 votes, or 95.23 percent of the total valid votes cast, while the other six candidates received only around 4%.
Professor Joshua Alabi, the current Speaker of Parliament, received 3,404 votes, or 1.52 percent, followed by Goosie Tanoh, who received 2,091 votes, or 0.93 percent; Ekwow Spio Garbah, who received 1,447 votes, or 0.65 percent; Sylvester Mensah, who received 934 votes, or 0.42 percent; and Nurudeen Iddrisu, who received 520 votes, or 0.23 percent.
Will the pattern of today's presidential primary hold true after he travels the length and breadth of the nation to convince the party's delegates that he should be chosen to represent the party in the general election in 2024?
A new candidate, like former Finance Minister Dr. Duffuor, would give the NDC a chance to win the general election in 2024, according to recent research by the UK-based Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU).
If their projection is any indication, the race for flagbearership should be exciting.
But even before today's election, it looks like this wonderful chance was lost.
According to some political observers, Dr. Duffuor's legal action against the NDC to prevent the party from holding its primaries because of what he claimed were inconsistencies in the voter's register, along with his last-minute withdrawal from the contest, should rather help the party's internal democracy grow.
Delegates
Following the announcement of the case's withdrawal, some of the delegates the Daily Graphic spoke with yesterday indicated they were supporting the former president, Mahama.
Some of these delegates reportedly agreed with Dr. Duffuor's theme of empowering the grassroots to create a powerful party to retake power in 2024.
They said that the former finance minister's choice to use the legal system to address the issue rather than the party's internal mechanisms had diminished their affection and support for him.
However, Dr. Duffuor's initiative to guarantee openness and justice in the party's internal elections shouldn't be seen as an attempt to halt the NDC's forward movement to retake power.
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