The 2020 Flagbearer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), John Dramani Mahama, says the two retreats held by party executives and minority Members of Parliament (MP) have been informative and eye-opening.
According to the former President, the platform gave attendees an opportunity to review and discuss openly issues that confronted the NDC during the 2020 elections and also outlined some measures that could be put in place ahead of the next general election.
“In this effort to look forward, we held two retreats. One for the MPs and I was privileged to attend that retreat with them. It was very interesting. They did a lot of soul-searching and discussed very openly the issues that had confronted them in the early days in Parliament.
“Mr Speaker was there to give a very good speech to the MPs. We held another one for the party and party executives came from all around the regions and that was also a very positive retreat. Every region was asked to account for its performance in the 2020 elections and they came with reports.
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“It was obvious that they had all began to do their own reviews of what went right or wrong in their regions. You should have listened to some of the regional reports, they were very interesting. There was one region that said some of our party agents were illiterate, they couldn’t read or write and the chairman asked, but who made them party agents?”
Mr Mahama, who was speaking at the annual conference of the NDC Professionals Forum in Accra, Thursday, lauded national executives for taking an interest in happenings during the election and reviewing their individual performances.
“Let’s continue the process, let’s help them to continue that process so that it can put the party in a position to be able to help itself not only to play its role as the largest opposition party but to prepare itself for the next elections in 2024,” he said.
Again, he observed that certain ideas that came up with respect to specific regions will be considered and pursued.
“The party intends to carry this retreat out at the regional level. The national one was held in Ho, so the regions over the next few weeks, you will see them holding their own retreats to once again look at the issues that came up in 2020 and how they can reorganise the party structures. I am sure when they finish, all these will be brought together in reports so NEC can look at them, and if there are strategic decisions that need to be taken, they will be taken,” he added.
The former President also charged the NDC professionals not to shy away from becoming electoral officers during an election period.
He explained that opponents of the NDC take advantage of advertisements by the Electoral Commission (EC), thereby always being at an advantage.
“You must also not shy away from becoming officers of the EC. You have the qualification to be presiding officers and other electoral officers and our opponents have taken advantage of it.
“You will find that when the EC advertises, many of their people apply to become presiding officers and so they are the electoral officers, and of course you know what kind of advantages that can give them. When the opportunity arises, we must stand for elected positions and if you are capable and you believe that you can garner the support, nothing bars pro-forum members from going for such positions and we must also get many of our executives who are professionals to join pro-forum.”
Concluding his speech, Mr Mahama urged party professionals with in-depth knowledge in Information Technology (IT) to offer their services to the party as and when the need arises.
“I mean a lot of you in your professional work have had to use IT and now IT is becoming very important in terms of transmitting results and getting results in good time to be able to undertake the political decision making that is needed. And so we will expect that you will offer your services more to the party in these critical areas,” he appealed.