I endorsed Mahama because he consoled me when I was disqualified; I knew he’d lose – Ayariga

Flagbearer of the All Peoples’ Congress (APC), Hassan Ayariga has stated that looking at statistics available to him, he knew former President John Mahama would lose the 2016 presidential elections but still had to endorse him.

According to him, though he knew many National Democratic Congress (NDC) supporters were disenchanted with the party’s leadership, he chose to endorse Mr Mahama because the former president reached out to console him after the Electoral Commission disqualified him from contesting the elections.

Speaking in an interview on Joy FM’s Super Morning Show on Friday, he explained that over 90 percent of his core supporters had come from the then ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) and were bent of voting against the former president.

“The grassroots were not supportive. I formed a party and in my party, every day, we got not less than 200 members coming to join our party and when they come and I asked them, where they are coming from, out of the 200 people who came from different political parties, 90 percent were coming from the NDC. So when I look at the statistics, you could easily tell there is going to be problem. There was a disconnect between the leadership of the NDC and the grassroots”, he stated.

But I decided to endorse him “because when I was disqualified from the elections, the President called me to console me and said sorry about you loss. The NPP never called me”‘, he added.