Kwadwo Baah Agyemang has pulled out of the Asante Akim North parliamentary primary of the New Patriotic Party, describing the voting in the area as “illegal” and “concert activity”.
He told TV3 Saturday that he and his supporters will not be part of the illegality being perpetuated by the constituency executives who resolved to go ahead with the primary despite the filing of an injunction against the process.
Although the executives of the party at the national headquarters, the EC and the Police were served with the application Friday, the constituency executives claimd they have no knowledge whatsoever about such action against the party.
They accordingly went ahead with voting at all the 97 polling stations in the constituency Saturday morning to the dissatisfaction of Mr Baah Agyemang who is seeking to take over from the incumbent Andy Kwame Appiah Kubi.
“We ain’t in this illegal election that they are running,” the former MP for Asante Akim North who is staging a comeback told our correspondent Ibrahim Abubakar on TV3.
According to Mr Baah Agyemang, he had a call from the party’s administrator that due to the injunction filed by some 145 delegates whose names were allegedly expunged from the register, the primary in the constituency will not take place on Saturday as scheduled.
As a result, Mr Baah Agyemang who is the Board Chair of the National Sports Authority said if anyone is conducting primary in the area today, that “might be illegal or maybe they are having some concert activity”.
Mr Baah Agyemang said he is thus “not participating in any election today”.
Asked whether he will accept the results of today’s election, he responded: “I don’t think there is an election going on; from the organisers of the party, from the managers of the party, from the organisers of this primaries, they said there is no election so why should I accept something that is nonexistent”.
Constituency Secretary for the party, Williams Aboagye Boateng told our correspondent Ibrahim Abubakar earlier that they have not been served with any injunction application, hence not aware of any action restraining them from going ahead with the polls.
No injunction served on us
“So far as we are concerned nobody has received anything from anywhere. So we know that today we are going to have elections and we are having it. The delegates are ready, the constituency executives are ready and then elections are ongoing as you can see” he told TV3.
Mr Boateng claimed the Regional Executives of the party were aware elections were going to be held in the constituency Saturday.
“If there should be any injunction whatsoever, I think we should have been served a letter or call from the NEC or from the region to indicate that yes, indeed there are some injunction on Asante Akim North elections but so far, as we are concerned, nobody has spoken to us, we haven’t received anything from anybody” he said.
The injunction
Copies of the injunction has been served the party’s headquarters, the Electoral Commission, Ghana (EC), the Ashanti Regional Director of the EC, the Asante Akim North District Director of EC, Constituency Secretary, Ashanti Regional Secretary of the NPP and the Konongo Odumase Divisional Police Commander.
According to the writ, the injunction is to “restrain defendants, their servants, agents, privies or assigns or howsoever designated from proceeding with or in any way whatsoever conducting, supervising or dealing with or participating in any processes touching and concerning further activities or dealings towards the election or selection of 1st Defendant’s Parliamentary Candidate for the Asante Akim North Constituency of the Ashanti Region for participation in the General Elections in December 2020 pending the determination of the suit…, and for a further Order to 2nd Defendant not to participate in any activities towards and for the purpose of electing or selecting a Parliamentary Candidate for Asante Akim North Constituency…”
The delegates are said to be from 61 polling stations, mostly in Agogo.
By Stephen Kwabena Effah| 3news.com|Ghana