General News of Thursday, 9 September 2021
Source: www.ghanaweb.live
2021-09-09Election 2024: Politicians flexing their muscles far too early – Ben Ephson
The major political parties, NDC and NPP, are talking about the 2024 polls
• Eight months after 2020 polls, NDC and NPP are talking about 2024
• According to Ben Ephson, it is too early in the day
• He believes politicians will experience fatigue sooner than later
Politicians from the two main political parties are talking about the 2024 elections eight months after the last electoral cycle ended.
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The ruling New Patriotic Party is hammering on the ‘Break-The-Eight’ mantra whiles the main opposition National Democratic Congress want electoral reforms to start as quickly as possible.
Their flagbearer in the 2020 election, former President John Dramani Mahama is also on a national ‘Thank You Tour’ which has reached the Bono Region as of Tuesday, September 7.
It was on a local radio station in the region that he made comments to the effect that the next election will be vigorously policed by the NDC especially at the polling stations. His use of the term ‘do-or-die’ in his submission has attracted some backlash.
In the midst of all the political jostling, pollster and Managing Editor of the Insight newspaper says, with over three years before the next election, politicians are ‘flexing their muscles far too early,’ projecting further that most of them will run out of steam in the space of a year.
In an interview with Accra-based Joy News, the pollster said: “With only eight months, you have got three years and four months more to 2024, I think that all the politicians will be exhausted in a year and a half. They are flexing their muscles far too early.”
He disagreed with Mahama’s use of the term ‘do-or-die’ in relation to the next general elections, stressing that all it takes to win the election was vigilance and educated personnel at polling stations to guard the candidate and his party’s interest.
“So it is not a matter of dying at the polling station, it is a matter of just getting educated and loyal polling agents and that will be it.
“I think that Mahama is appealing to the base of the party. The 2020 elections were very close virtually a hung parliament and for example, the election of an NDC’s past Minority Leader Alban Bagbin as the speaker, the impression is that maybe NDC is in control of parliament and they will be able to do a few more things. You can protect your ballot at the polling station without dying,” he stressed.
