NDC may not meet December 7 deadline - Spio-Garbrah

A National Democratic Congress (NDC) presidential candidate hopeful, Ekwow Spio-Garbrah has expressed scepticism over the party's ability to hold its planned National Delegates Congress on or before December 7, 2018 to elect a flagbearer for the 2020 elections.

He believes the new national executives, to be elected November 17, 2018, will have little time to plan and execute a well-coordinated poll.

The party goes to the polls to elect national officers and will follow it up with the election of a flagbearer latest December 7, at a yet to be determined venue, in line with its constitution.

The NDC constitution states that the party must have a presidential candidate in place two clear years before the national polls; a requirement the former Minister of Trade and Industry said would be difficult to meet considering the time.

Speaking in an interview with the Ghanaian Times in Accra on Monday, Mr Spio-Garbrah, who is taking a shot at the flagbearership slot for the second time, stressed the limited time has been a worry to aspirants.

According to him, “the new executives will have to learn the ropes of the structure of the party and organising elections to be partaken by 270,000 delegates; a situation which looks “unlikely.”

Explaining preparatory processes ahead of the polls, Mr Spio-Garbrah noted that “printing of ballot papers, a compilation of the voters’ register, provision of other logistical materials and transporting same before the deadline may not be realised within the two weeks of assumption of the new executive body.

“My fears, has been exacerbated by the new faces who are hoping to take leadership of the party, in my estimation, 80 per cent of the persons seeking to be elected to the various positions are new faces and should a tsunami, which I suspect, sweeps through the party, they may be unable to organise themselves to organise a poll which will be accepted by all,” Mr Spio-Garbrah cautioned.

Speaking on his campaign, the former Chief Executive of the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organisation indicated that the 2020 electioneering campaign must hinge on what was in stock for the electorate in the future and not what had been achieved in the past.

Mr Spio-Garbrah urged the delegates to vote for a candidate who would move the NDC beyond the 2020 general election.