GhanaPoliticsOnline.Com
The assualt of Ali Zakaria in Saturday’s super delegates conference of the governingNewPatrioticParty “doesn’t make sense”, flagbearer hopeful Alan Kyerematen has condemned.
Mr Zakaria, who served as the North East regional coordinator of the former Trade Minister’s campaign team during the first-round poll to whittle the 10 aspirants down to five, suffered untempered violence during the special delegates conference.
The brutal attack left him hospitalised.
The assault occurred after Ali Zakaria questioned some voters for publicly displaying their ballot papers to other delegates.
He recounted being outnumbered and caught off guard, becoming the target of aggressive individuals.
The attack reportedly came from supporters of Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia.
Condemning the attack on his team member, Mr Kyerematen told journalists on Tuesday, 29 August 2023 after a meeting between all the aspirants and the leadership of the party, that: “What happened to my colleague on Saturday was an act of total indiscipline and indecent behaviour”.
“How do we, as a decent party going into an election, particularly at the level of super delegates, superintend such behaviour?” Mr Kyerematen wondered.
He said: “We all joined the NPP because of our commitment to the values of the party, but what is happening clearly shows this is not what we bargained for, by joining the party”.
He warned: “I am not going to tolerate this kind of behaviour. It doesn’t make sense”.
Mr Kyerematen wondered what Saturday’s incident portends for the November primaries which has a very large electoral college.
“When we cannot conduct ourselves as a family, trying to select a leader in a peaceful and organised manner, how do we intend to be able to do the same kind of process with 200 000-plus people gathered?”
“So, I’m frankly, very disturbed about what happened”, he noted, adding: “The party must not put a shine on this kind of incident and we’ll have to try to understand why this happened in an internal elections”.
“My interest now is about the health of my colleague here. Let’s focus on that. That is why we’re here’, Mr Kyerematen retorted when questioned about his prospects in the November conference.
