Spio-Garbrah outlines ‘pillars’ to strengthen NDC, return party to power

Presidential-candidate hopeful of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Ekwow Spio-Garbrah, has outlined what he believes are the strategic pillars to strengthen the party.

He said these pillars, which include the establishment of decent offices in constituencies, will make the party attractive to win power in the 2020 general elections.

He said the well-crafted plan would fortify the party intellectually, economically, socially, psychologically and physically.

In an interview with journalists in Accra, Mr Spio-Garbrah hinted of plans to strengthen the party’s structures, beginning with the establishement decent offices at the constituency level with basic office equipment.

“Currently when you go round the country you will find that some of the constituency offices are in shambles, in fact, most of them do not have an office, and meetings are held in school buildings and shacks of all kinds. This does not befit a party that has been in office for 16 years. As a presidential aspirant I will work with officials and businessmen who believe in the party from their local area to get them a befitting office”, he said.

As part of the seven strategies, the former Trade Minister disclosed that his leadership would see the establishment of welfare committees and welfare fund at the national, regional and the constituency level.

Each of the Committees, he explained, would have a separate bank account to save voluntary contributions to assist and support party members in financial difficulties.



“Such initiative will be used to support elderly party members who have been forgotten by the party after serving their twilight years. They are all over the country and I have visited and maintained constant communications with some in the Central, Western, Upper West and Ashanti Regions. Some of them are bedridden while others were in wheelchairs and they need support,” he stressed.



To maintain a constant connection with the party grassroots, Mr Spio-Garbrah said when elected as the leader of the party, he would spend most of the time at the NDC party headquarters to enable him to be accessible and interact with members.

“When I become the president I will find an afternoon every week to spend time with party members and chair meetings at the party office,” he said.

He gave a hint of developing an internal ideology for the party that would be based on the best policies of Dr Kwame Nkrumah and Former President Rawlings rather than the current ideology of social democrats the party pride itself with.

Mr Spio-Garbrah said under his leadership, a human capacity development through a lifelong mentorship initiative would be established to guide young party members in the areas including legal, medicine, construction, trade, industry finance, communication and media.

“The party has successful legal luminaries and communications experts who have the experience and are ready to mentor young party members who are beginning their careers and will become successful and contribute meaningfully to the party”

He commended the party leadership for establishing the Institute for Social Development and said the human development vision would further be strengthened.

On the vision for women, Mr Spio-Garbrah indicated his plans to revive the women wing of the party by working to potentially bring the Former First lady Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings back to the party to make the wing vibrant.

“The women's wing has become very weak after the ruling New Patriotic Party, upon assumption of power, was attacked by 12 state institutions and crippled their activities. Women play a formidable and frontal role in the party but now that they need to be resuscitated. In the Ashanti region when I met over 58 NDC communicators only four were women”



Drawing inspiration from his former position at the Action Chapel as Chief Executive, he proposed to establish a credit union for the party to strengthen its financial capacity.

“With the credit union, all party members will be shareholders. The few cedis that party members are being paid today and other party funds would be lodged and managed by financial experts so that members can enjoy the interest,” he said.