Professor Kobby Mensah, an associate professor of marketing at the University of Ghana Business School (UGBS), has urged the Electoral Commission of Ghana (EC), security services, and political parties to take action over the recent comments made by the Minister of Food and Agriculture.
Bryan Acheampong, last weekend, mounted a platform at Mpraeso in the Eastern Region to address supporters of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), vowing to ensure that the party does not hand over power to the National Democratic Congress (NDC) even if they win the 2024 elections.
He also indicated that the NPP has the “men” to face the NDC if the latter employs violence in seeking to return to power.
Speaking on The Keypoints on TV3/3FM on Saturday, April 15, Prof Kobby Mensah said the comments by the Abetifi MP is a cause for concern.
“For me, I think that the EC must be concerned, the security agencies must be concerned, the political parties must be concerned, which the NDC has actually said they are concerned about,” he said.
Already, the opposition NDC has petitioned the Inspector-General of Police (IGP) to invite the Agriculture Minister for questioning.
The move, spearheaded by the party’s Director of Legal Affairs, Abraham Amaliba, provoked the NPP to also petition the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service to probe 2020 Presidential Candidate John Dramani Mahama and National Chairman Johnson Asiedu Nketia for similar comments.
But Prof Kobby Mensah said he was scandalised and, indeed, taken aback about the failure of the NPP to apologise for the comments by one of their own but rather backing them.
“I expected [the NPP] not to give away the Minister but I was expecting them to actually apologise, be remorseful and say that the Minister was carried away [and] we don’t think that this is the appropriate communication and we will have an internal process.
“In the meantime, we express that regret to the Ghanaian people. That would have been a fantastic political communication,” he stressed.
He expressed conviction that Mr Acheampong had been chastised in private by his party but expects a public action too.
For him, this could be a speech act to influence supporters of the NPP in acting untoward on election day.