National Democratic Congress (NDC) flagbearer aspirant, Ekwow Spio-Garbrah, after officially filing his nomination at the party’s headquarters on Tuesday, paid an additional amount of Ghc5,000 Ghana cedis to support the party.
Mr. Spio-Grabrah, who was part of the aspirants who petitioned the party over the high cost of filing and nomination fee, however advised the party to find better ways of generating money for activities such as elections, rather than monetizing internal elections by slapping high fees on aspirants.
He says that situation only leaves out capable members who cannot afford the filing fees. His comment is in response to the party’s claim that it had organized several elections internally and that it needed money to hold the presidential primaries, for which reason they had to increase the charges astronomically.
“Even though I was one of those who asked for the figure to be reduced from 400, 000 Ghana cedis, and I am still insisting the figure should be reduced, I am paying the extra 5000 cedis to demonstrate that it is not an unwillingness to contribute to the party, it is not an incapability, but it is a matter of principles,”
“This party should not forget its rules and should not attempt to mimic other parties and should not attempt to commercialize itself to the point where it prizes out of the market many wonderful members of the party who may not necessarily have all the resources we think we need to run an election,” he said.
According to him, the party has to become more entrepreneurial and business-minded to help strengthen and make the party more viable for 2020.
Ekwow Spio Garbrah, and Goosie Tanoh, today [Tuesday] officially filed their nomination at the party’s headquarters to contest the NDC’s presidential race.
This brings to seven the number of persons who have filed to contest for the primaries slated for Saturday, January 26, 2019. Today, Tuesday, December 18, 2018, was the last day for the submission of forms.
However, one of the aspirants, Stephen Atubiga, could not submit his forms as he announced his withdrawal to support John Dramani Mahama.
In the petition, nine aspirants proposed that fees for collection of forms be GHc 5,000 whiles the filing fees be GHc 100,000.
The NDC reduced the filing fee to Ghc300,000 and maintained Ghc20,000 for the form, after a proposal by its Council of Elders.
The Functional Executive Committee (FEC) acting on behalf of the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the party, agreed to the reduction, although the aspirants think the amounts charged were still high.
Aggrieved presidential aspirants didn’t pay a dime for NDC internal elections – Ade Coker
The Greater Accra Regional Chairman of the opposition National Democratic Congress [NDC], Joseph Ade Coker, had said earlier that the nine aggrieved presidential hopefuls of the party refused to support all of the NDC’s internal activities that have taken place so far, when they were asked to assist.
Speaking on the Breakfast Daily Show on Citi TV, Mr. Ade Coker, who is part of the NDC’s National Executive Committee, NEC, said, “I feel sorry for those aspirants. This is a party that has had branch, constituency, regional and national elections, but none of them contributed even a dime. When the Council of Elders met them and asked each of them to contribute to the party, they refused. They were called to the Council of Elders meeting and asked to contribute about GhC50,000, none of them did. They saw the party going through all the processes. In all these processes, it was the GhC1.00 contributions from the branch leaders that was used to conduct the branch elections.”
–
By: Farida Yusif | citinewsroom.com | Ghana
