FIVE CONCEDE DEFEAT

Posted on: www.dailyguideghana.com

By William Yaw Owusu

Friday, December 09, 2016

All the presidential candidates - with the exception of incumbent President John Dramani Mahama - in last Wednesday’s general elections have sent congratulatory messages to the New Patriotic Party (NPP) presidential candidate, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.

The NPP said yesterday that Nana Akufo-Addo had won the presidential election but the Charlotte Osei-led Electoral Commission (EC) had refused to declare the results, citing over-voting as the basis.

The candidates, Ivor Kobina Greenstreet of the Convention People’s Party (CPP); former First Lady Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings, presidential aspirant of the National Democratic Party (NDP); Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom, People’ Progressive Party (PPP); Dr. Edward Nasigre Mahama, People’s National Convention (PNC) as well as Jacob Osei-Yeboah, an independent candidate, have sent their congratulatory messages to Nana Akufo-Addo.

Acknowledgement

Nana Akufo-Addo confirmed yesterday that he had indeed been congratulated by his contenders on social media platform -Twitter – to acknowledge receipt of the messages.

“I've received words of congratulation from Mr Greenstreet, Mrs Rawlings, Dr Nduom, Dr Mahama & Mr Yeboah. I thank them. May God bless Ghana,” he tweeted.

PPP’s Dr. Nduom posted on Facebook that “I wish to congratulate the Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo of the NPP for (sic) for winning the presidential election based on results available to me. The wind of change has blown in his favour. The NPP worked hard for this victory.”

He added, “I accept the decision of the people on behalf of the PPP. We must all now work hard to make our country great and strong and the people prosperous.”

Former First Lady Mrs Rawlings said, “Ghana has spoken. Ghana has voted for change. Congratulations Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.”

PNC’s Dr. Mahama said in a tweet, “I will like to congratulate Nana Akufo-Addo of the NPP for winning the 2016 general election based on my projections.”

He went ahead to call on the other political parties to concede defeat, especially the ‘sitting president,’ saying, “I call on my other contenders to do same, especially the sitting president, to concede gracefully. This is a victory for all Ghana.”

Unnecessary Anxiety

There is anxiety in the country following delay in releasing the presidential election results, about 24 hours after the keenly contested election was concluded.

This has drawn the NPP and the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) into a war of words over who is doing the right thing, thereby heightening the already anxious situation.

The NPP, through its National Youth Organizer Sammy Awuku, held a news conference yesterday and said its parallel tally of almost all the 28,992 polling stations gave the NPP candidate an unassailable lead, but the NDC had also countered the claim, saying that President Mahama was to be re-elected but they could not give any figures to the media. 

According to the NPP, its parallel tally of 27,577 out of 28,992, representing 94.23 percent of the polling stations results, had put their candidate, Nana Akufo-Addo, in a commanding lead of 53.79 percent over President John Mahama’s 44.42 percent.

He said that that translated into some 5,441,642 votes for Nana Akufo-Addo and 4,497,477 for President Mahama - which is a clear difference of 944,165 - adding that with only 1,690 pink sheets yet to be recorded, even if all the votes were awarded to the incumbent NDC candidate, the provisional results would not be overturned.