2020 polls: Alabi failed Mahama, NDC now in serious crisis – Atubiga

Prof Joshua Alabi failed former President John Mahama in the 2020 polls, a former flagbearer aspirant of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Mr Stephen Atubiga, has said.

According to him, as the Campaign Manager of the NDC’s 2020 polls, Prof Alabi should have properly coordinated the activities of the parties to ensure effective prosecution of the campaign but failed to live up to expectation, in his view.

“Prof Alabi’s office didn’t deliver”, Mr Atubiga told Kofi Oppong Asamoah in an interview on Class91.3FM’s mid-day news programme 12Live on Friday, 5 March 2021, adding: “He’s our campaign manager, his office did not coordinate [the campaign]”.

In his view, had Prof Alabi done his job well, the lapses that occurred in the Strong Room of the Electoral Commission would not have happened.

“Mac Manu was there [Strong Room]. Prof Alabi was supposed to be at the EC’s office to make sure that our results, John Dramani Mahama’s results were accounted for; the party’s results were also accounted for. That didn’t happen. He also did not coordinate well to make sure that a national executive person was at the EC headquarters”, Mr Atubiga said.

Mr Atubiga believes Mr Mahama “won this election but our negligence started from our campaign manager’s office and then the irresponsible representatives that we had in the EC’s office”.

He has, thus, served notice of his intention to petition the leadership of the party to probe what he considers a dereliction of duty on the part of Prof Alabi and other people who were given key responsibilities with regard to the polls.

“I mean, it is unforgivable and I, Atubiga, with the team, instead of appealing to them, will be filing a petition to the party officially to sanctions. We want the campaign manager, to those that left their place ajar, all of them have to be sanctioned and punished and if it has to also extend to the members of parliament that they also have to be punished based on what the investigations will come out with, yes”.

Mr Atubiga also alleged that some of the party’s polling agents sold the NDC’s copies of the pink sheets to their opponents for between GHS2,000 and GHS5,000.

“That is why we want to petition the party to officially invite most of the constituencies that sold pink sheets to our opponents and ran away, who sanctioned them to be there? People have to be punished”.

“We are petitioning the party to hold the campaign manager, Prof Alabi, responsible for his actions and inactions.

“It is his office that had to coordinate with the Women’s Organiser. As a campaign manager of the biggest opposition party, he is supposed to coordinate with the Women’s Organiser: ‘Do you have enough logistics?’ Our Women’s Organiser has come out to tell us that she only had GHS4,000 and 30 T-shirts, the whole country; it’s very shameful and unacceptable”, he fumed.

The NDC, he noted, is currently in a serious crisis.

“We’re in crisis. Our party is in serious crisis. There is loyalty crisis. There is integrity crisis internally. What I mean by integrity crisis is: there is a lot of circumstances that led to our loss. We are in crisis right now – our MPs, who we look up to as our government, right now there is crisis in the inner circle extended to the youth; they are agitating but I want to say that we should calm down, it’s not all lost, we’ll resolve our problems but at this moment, the NDC is in crisis”.

“It is the most serious crisis, turbulence that we are going through from how we betrayed the candidate. There was a big alleged betrayal that has led to our loss. This loss is one of the most unacceptable, unfortunate and painful loss that we were not supposed to have incurred”.