The National Democratic Congress (NDC) Parliamentary Candidate for Ledzokuku, Nii Nortey Dua, has appealed to the chiefs and elders of Teshie Traditional Council to advise all the political parties in the area to ensure that the 2008 election is conducted in a free and fair manner.
Nii Dua promised to make the development of the area his priority when given the mandate.
He said as a member of the district assembly for 11 years, he was conversant with the problems facing the area and was the best person to lead the people to solve them.
“I am one of you; I have been working with and you also know my worth. I am, therefore, pleading with you to help me win the seat,” he told the elders.
Nii Dua, who was a sports presenter with the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC) but had to resign his position to contest the Lezdokuku seat for the NDC, said his priority as the MP for the area would be the provision of water.
That, he said, would start with the continuation of the water project which was started by the NDC administration but had been abandoned by the NPP government.
He said the provision of adequate potable water for people would go a long way to prevent diseases like diarrhoea which affected many people.
The NDC candidate said “all the roads which have been tarred in this town were done in the period when NDC was in power, and nothing has been added to it”.
He explained that because most of the roads were not tarred, people had taken undue advantage and encroached on the untarred roads, hampering smooth driving in the area.
Nii Dua said the problem also caused traffic jams in the area because there were very few arterial roads, forcing most motorists to use the main road.
Reverend Martey Odonkor, Regent of Atofoste, urged members and supporters of all political parties to see themselves first as a Ghanaians before considering their party affiliation.
He asked all the political parties seeking the interest of all the people to organise their campaigns with decorum.
Nii Dua said that the NDC had had enough of cheating, especially during the 2004 parliamentary election which was rigged in broad daylight and that the party would not allow victory to be taken way from it again.
Nii Dua made the appeal when he was introduced to the chiefs and elders of the Teshie Traditional Council in Accra after his successful election as the NDC candidate. Nii Dua contested the 2004 election on the ticket of the NDC and lost to Dr (Mrs) Gladys Ashittey, the current New Patriotic Party (NPP) MP.
Describing how the elections was rigged, Nii Dua said just before the ballot papers were to be distributed for transportation to the polling station, it was realised that the parliamentary ballot papers were short by 1,959.
Nii Dua said the NDC drew the attention of the EC officials to the shortfall and followed it up with a petition to the headquarters of the commission, but that did not yield any good results.
“After the election and the calculations of all the ballots cast at the various polling stations, we realised that the stolen ballot papers had mysteriously found their way into the ballot boxes, all in favour of the NPP candidate”, he added.
According to him, all these happened at 22 polling stations.
“We take part of the blame because some of our polling agents also gave in to things that led to some of these things that happened to us. But this time round our polling agents would be made up of able-bodied, experienced, loyal and committed party members who will not compromise easily ”, Nii Dua added.
He said but for his personal intervention, some of his supporters were going to demonstrate and prevent the EC from pronouncing the NPP candidate as the winner and pleaded with the chiefs to advise all the other aspirants and the EC against such an incident this time.
He said if it happened again, he would not be in a position to prevent his supporters from demonstrating.
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