Former President John Dramani Mahama became the presidential candidate of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) for the fourth time on Saturday, May 13, 2023, after winning the party’s presidential primaries for the 2024 elections.
This puts the former president in the bracket of two Ghanaians who have contested in 4 elections to become the
However, Dr Edward Mahama holds the record of the Ghanaian who has contested the most in presidential elections, with five presidential runs.
John Dramani Mahama would be, however, setting new records for presidential officeholders if he wins the December 7, 2024, presidential elections.
Here are some of the new records that will be set if Mahama becomes president again:
Longest serving democratically elected president:
Currently, former President John Agyekum Kufuor, as well as the late former Presidents Jerry John Rawlings and John Evans Atta Mills, hold the joint record of the longest-serving democratically elected presidents. They have all been in the Office of the President of Ghana for eight years.
The late Jerry John Rawlings is, however, the longest-serving head of state of Ghana, having served as a military ruler for 11 years and 117 days and a democratically elected president for 8 years (19 years and 117 days in total).
The record for the longest-serving democratically elected president will go to John Dramani Mahama if he wins the 2024 elections.
Mahama has already been president for 4 years and 167 days, and if he becomes president for another 4 years, he would have held the office of the president for 8 years and 167 days.
The only democratically elected president who has held the Sword of the State three times:
So far, four of the democratically elected presidents of Ghana in the 4th Republic – Rawlings, Kufuor, Mahama and Akufo-Addo – have been sworn into office and held the sword of state two times.
The late Prof Atta Mills and the other elected leaders of Ghana in the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Republics only held the state sword once.
Mahama, having held the state sword twice, the first time when he became president, on July 24, 2012, after the demise of Prof Atta Mills and the second time on January 7, 2013, when he won the 2012 election, would hold it (the sworn) again if he is sworn into office on January 7, 2025.
There are arguments that Rawlings might have held the sword of state three times – once as a military leader and two times as an elected president – but Mahama will hold the record if he wins the 2024 presidential elections.
Other records that would be broken:
Former President Mahama’s wife, the former First Lady Lordina Mahama, would be the longest-serving first lady in the democratic dispensation of Ghana.
Mahama would also set new records as Ghana’s representative at the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the African Union’s Assembly of Heads of State and Government, and the United Nations General Assembly. He will be the president who has represented Ghana the most at these organisations.
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Mahama holding the sword of state
