Why Is The New Patriotic Party Tearing Itself Apart So Glaringly In The Open?

Why is Ghana's largest opposition party, the New Patriotic Party (NPP), tearing itself apart so glaringly,  and in such open fashion, one wonders?

Why the confounding struggle for power that risks destroying the party's chances of winning the 2016 presidential and parliamentary elections?

According to bush-telegraph sources, and some of Ghana's conspiracy theorists, the infighting in the NPP, is for control of the billions of cedis in kickbacks expected to flow into the party's coffers, when it wins the November 2016 presidential and parliamentary elections.

Naturally, some might be say that that is a rather cynical and unfair view, for anyone to take.

Those who take that view of the NPP's current difficulties, insist that the plutocrats amongst those who organise funding for the party, saw the election of their preferred candidate as the party's candidate for the 2016 presidential election, as an opportunity to transform the NPP into the financial equivalent of a special purpose vehicle, which they would take full control of.

The election of the strong-willed and independent-minded Paul Afoko and Kwabena Adjei Agyapong as national chairperson and general secretary, respectively,  of the NPP, with overwhelming majorities, was therefore a major setback for those plutocrats.

It ought to be pointed out that the NPP's plutocrats don't actually believe in democracy - a mindset encapsulated perfectly in Atta Akyea's infamous and revealing December 2008 statement uttered in a secretly recorded conversation aired on Radio Gold FM's Election Forensics programme hosted by Raymond Archer: "Saa democracy nonsense yi."

It is also a fact that those super-clever NPP plutocrats have conveniently cloaked themselves ostentatiously with the garb of democracy - in order to remain respectable in Ghanaian society. Their ultimate goal is to dominate Ghana from the shadows when the NPP wins power in the November 2016 presidential and parliamentary elections.

Apparently, they vowed to cut short the tenures of Afoko and Agyapong, and remove them from office, the very day the two gentlemen were elected to their positions - hard facts on the ground regarded as mere irritating irrelevances by the said plutocrats.

And as is the case with plutocrats worldwide, the NPP plutocrats seeking to depose Paul Afoko and Kwabena Agyapong, in a coup, feel that somehow they are above the laws of Ghana and that they are not bound by societal norms - and can therefore act with impunity whenever it suits them. What, hubris.

Alas, they don't care a whit, what effect their actions have on the party's reputation and image - as long as they achieve the ends they seek. Unfortunately, their hubris has left the image and reputation of the NPP in tatters.

And it explains why two leading and longstanding party members, both elected to their national executive positions with overwhelming majorities, in a political party that says it is a bastion of individual liberty, and an upholder of the rule of law, have suddenly become the victims of a scorched-earth Machiavellian-strategy, meant to enable those NPP plutocrats take full control of the NPP's finances.

Unfortunately, the NPP's plutocrats have miscalculated terribly. That grave error of judgment will almost certainly result in the NPP losing many crucial votes amongst independent-minded and patriotic Ghanaians who are totally fed up with the fact that the NDC/NPP duopoly continues to be beholden to the vested interests bleeding Mother Ghana dry.

It is unfortunate that a political party many Ghanaians hoped would replace the party now in  power is tearing itself apart so glaringly and in such open fashion - because a few amoral plutocrats want to take full control of its finances before the 2016 presidential and parliamentary elections: and doubtless make hay whiles the sun shines on them in the period between January 7th, 2017 and January 7th, 2021. Pity.