IN 2000, then President J. J. Rawlings campaigned vigorously for Professor John Evans Atta Mills, his chosen successor. That was when he was at the peak of his power and glory.
The National Democratic Congress (NDC) campaign trail, with a large fleet of powerful four-wheel drive vehicles criss-crossing the country, was more of a road show. At that time, the campaign message was ‘Continuity’, as the NDC credited itself with the economic and social transformation of the country.
Cash and logistics were not in short supply and so blistering and powerful were the campaign and the dominance of the then President Rawlings on the nation’s political landscape that there was no question about victory. If there were any doubts, then it was about how many votes the party was going to garner to transfer power from Rawlings to Prof Mills.
The New Patriotic Party (NPP) and its flag bearer, Mr J. A. Kufuor, were, on the other hand, scraping the patchy earth for resources to effect their campaign. Their signboards were virtually invisible and the few campaign vehicles were overstretched. The campaign message was ‘Positive Change’, but the battlefield was a typical David and Goliath affair.
Even before the nation went to battle on December 7, 2000, the cracks started to show in the NDC when a youthful group under the name the National Reform Party (NRP) broke away on matters of principle about the manner the flag bearer of the party was chosen. The NDC was so confident of its support base that it made very little effort to bring back the NRP rebels into its fold.
The jolt came and with that the realisation that politics is, after all, about numbers and not mere slogans and campaign rhetoric when the first results of the December 7, 2000 polls started to arrive. In the end, the NDC lost the elections. It saw its parliamentary strength whittled down from 133, which it had won in 1996, to 92. Its presidential candidate, Prof Mills, trailed the NPP’s Kufuor with 44 per cent of the votes, while the latter had 48 per cent to call for a re-run.
Some of the top NDC members were so shocked that they never recovered enough to go into battle for the run-off. In the run-off, Kufuor polled 56 per cent of the votes to succeed Rawlings as Ghana’s second President in the Fourth Republic.
Straight away, it was obvious that complacency and somehow arrogance of power had played big roles in the NDC’s defeat, not discounting the fact that many Ghanaians were just tired of seeing the same faces on the television screens and in the newspapers for almost 20 years.
The fortunes of the NDC did not improve very much during the 2004 elections. There were internal jostling in an attempt to replace Prof Mills as the presidential candidate. There were those who felt he had not got the charisma and stature to be a good replacement for Rawlings whose popularity was unparalleled. Others saw him as a newcomer whose roots in the party had not developed yet.
The Legon Congress to elect a flag bearer recorded some broken bones, squeezing of balls and sprinkling of a few pints of blood. Even though Dr Kwesi Botchway looked more appealing to some of the younger generation, Rawlings’ authority and dominance prevailed and Prof Mills got the mandate for another try.
The seeds of acrimony planted at the Legon Congress germinated and followed the NDC into the 2004 elections and defeat was obvious, as Prof Mills was left without the spiritual, physical and financial support of people like Dr Obed Asamoah, who was then the Chairman of the party. It managed only 94 seats in an expanded Parliament of 230 seats.
The death knell was sounding and it was only a matter of time before the great umbrella party crumbled, so many, especially the ruling NPP, thought.
The Koforidua Congress held in the early part of 2006 to elect national officers brought more division into the party which saw the breaking away of another faction led by Dr Obed Asamoah, who lost his bid for the chairmanship, to form the Democratic Freedom Party (DFP).
The party went ahead to elect Prof Mills at another congress at Legon as its flag bearer. Those who contested him were Alhaji Iddrisu Mahama, Dr Ekwow Spio-Garbrah and Mr Eddie Annan. From then on, the party regained its lost confidence and started a slow return to prominence which was not noticed by the ruling NPP.
The 2008 elections saw a replay of the 2000 scenario, with shifting of positions. The NPP is now in power and campaigned virtually on the message of continuity since, throughout the campaign, the chorus was to continue with the good works of the Kufuor Administration. The slogan, ‘Moving Forward’, was quite catchy and the accompanying songs were very sweet to the ear. But as the NPP will soon realise, it takes more than beautiful slogans and sweet songs to win elections.
The war chest was bountiful and other logistics were in abundance. The billboards were huge, well illuminated and visible everywhere. What was lacking was a critical mind to do fair and objective analysis of the real situation on the ground.
The party did everything it needed to do in the form of media attention, both in print and electronically. It engaged a bunch of media men who saturated the media with praise-singing and mudslinging but it failed to put its ears on the ground.
Its presidential candidate was fed with what it wanted to hear — that there was no challenger and that Nana was the number one choice of Ghanaians. The battle cry was, therefore, One Touch. There was some divine twist when Nana Akufo-Addo’s name appeared on the number one spot on the ballot.
What they failed to contend with, was an emerging culture in Ghana’s politics where people get fed up with governments after eight years. To say you are continuing with an outgoing President’s policies, to many, means old wine in a new barrel.
The National School Feeding Programme, the Capitation Grant and the National Health Insurance Scheme which were trump cards the NPP was playing did not make any impression on many, especially the first two.
The NDC’s message of ‘Change for a better Ghana’ was, as events have proved, more attractive to the majority of the people. When the results of the December 7, 2008 came, it was obvious that there was something dangerously amiss and the NPP was heading for defeat. It lost 20 of its parliamentary seats to the NDC.
The sod-cutting spree embarked upon by President Kufuor before the elections was negative. The sophisticated nature of the Ghanaian voter was seriously underrated.
The government, and for that matter the party, went panicky after the first round and compounded matters with certain decisions. The party fell into a neat trap when it reduced the prices of petroleum products, just when Prof Mills had announced that it would be his first major assignment. The release of convicted drivers did not look sincere and the setting up of a task force on pair trawling at a time when the main fishing season was over only exposed the desperation of the government and the party.
The announcement that some of the Ga-Dangme lands acquired by government had been released to their original owners and the picture of Ms Christine Churcher sprawling before fishermen on a beach begging for votes fuelled the suspicion that the appeal for votes was meant more for the personal aggrandisement of some people and not for the general interest of Ghanaians.
The worst came when a so-called hit list was fed into the system. It does not make any sense to tell Ghanaians that when the NDC comes to power it will eliminate some people, when it should have been the other way round. It would have sounded a bit more logical to say that those who frustrate NDC’s quest for power will suffer some reprisal.
The number and names of people on the hit list made the whole thing a mockery of natural intelligence and the NPP was never forgiven by the people of this country. The subsequent closure of the borders under flimsy excuses and the events after December 28, 2008 when some party members went to court did not add to the democratic credentials of the party.
That made many people to cast their minds back to 2000, when the NDC lost the elections. That was when Rawlings was the monarch of all that he surveyed and with his popularity still intact, he could have done anything.
It was even rumoured in those days that if the NDC had lost the election, it would not hand over. There were even threats that there would be mayhem should it lose the elections, so people were pleading that in order to save this nation, NDC should be retained in power.
Well, there was a smooth handing over, even though we were told that containers with souvenir items for the celebration of victory had arrived at the Tema Port. That was how the international community started to heap praises on Ghana’s determination to remain on course in her practice of democracy.
In 2004, even though the NDC cried foul and some of its leading members went to court over allegations of electoral malpractice, the nation never went through any trauma as witnessed on December 7 and 28, 2008 and January 2, 2009. Ghana’s democracy came to be appreciated by the world, and became a reference point for other African countries trying to chart a democratic path of governance.
In 2008, we came close to disaster and nearly eroded the confidence and respect we had won over the years. The difference is not lost on many Ghanaians and it will just be fair to advise that the NPP starts an immediate image-building exercise and prepare itself for 2012.
By now our politicians have started realising that they can indulge in all the noise-making, self-adulation and glorification but the real decision-makers will be waiting silently for the right time.
The NDC may not make a second a mistake, if it cares, and the NPP, should the opportunity come again, will do the right thing, instead of wasting resources on socio-political analysts and commentators who are nothing but a drain on its coffers. That is the strength of our democracy which is maturing every day.
The storm is over and now that Ghanaians have decided to change the vehicle and the driver, shall we, as one people, head towards the right direction?
fokofi@yahoo.co.uk
kofiakordor.blogspot.com
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