Nana Konadu was accompanied by two of her daughters, Amina and Yaa Asantewaa, to the party office in what promises to be a gruelling battle with the sitting President John Atta Mills.
Nana Konadu is launching her campaign today at the Accra International Conference Centre where four other speakers including onetime NDC General Secretary, Dr Nii Armah Josiah Aryeh, will address the gathering.
“I have an official invitation, I will be there and I will be speaking also… I will be vouching for the candidate,” he revealed, adding that he would be speaking in the capacity “as somebody who has been very close to the party’s apparatus and somebody who could speak for her.
“Certainly, it will be untenable for me to speak for her if I don’t support her candidature. I support democracy within the NDC and I support democracy across the entire spectrum of Ghanaian politics that the more competition we have in our politics, the better quality of politicians that emerges,” he told Citi FM.
Former President Jerry Rawlings has indicated that it would not be an easy battle because of the people involved. At the party headquarters, aside the huge crowd that Nana Konadu attracted, mostly the youth, the event witnessed chaotic scenes when the founder’s wife arrived.
Security and protocol were upped whilst journalists were manhandled by a group of rampaging party foot-soldiers who called themselves ‘Savannah boys.’
It all started when news of Mrs Rawlings’s arrival got to her supporters around 10:20am. By this time, most of the supporters approached her convoy of about fifteen vehicles led by a motorcade.
Among her retinue were the Rawlingses’ spokesman who doubles as a Deputy General Secretary of the party, Kofi Adams, and the tough-talking Member of Parliament for Lower Manya, Micheal Teye Nyaunu and others.
Businessman and close associate of the Rawlingses, Herbert Mensah was seen taking photographs of the events as they unfolded.
Immediately they alighted from their vehicles, the ‘Savannah boys’ gathered to provide security for the former First Family who arrived in a black Toyota 4×4 V8, led by motorbikes amidst drumming and dancing from her teeming supporters clad in white t-shirts.
What made matters worse was the near stampede at the entrance of the NDC headquarters as party supporters and journalists struggled to make their way into the yard. By this time, the ‘Savannah boys’ had barricaded the gate and were preventing people from entering.
Not even the plea of journalists by showing their identity cards in order to be allowed into the compound to cover the event would convince the overzealous security.
The handful of policemen on duty were virtually rendered useless as they were overwhelmed by the huge crowd, some of whom wore t-shirts with inscriptions like ‘be bold, the great hope, our last chance’, ‘right change, real change, right choice’.
The t-shirts were on demand like hotcake and people were seen scrambling and in some cases, even fought for them whilst motor cyclists were on hand to display dangerous skills.
As expected, Nana Konadu’s posters had been splashed all over the place bearing the inscription ‘for victory, vote for Nana Konadu’.
When the founder’s wife made her way to the office together with her children and members of her campaign team, she was said to have been met and welcomed by NDC General Secretary Johnson Asiedu Nketiah and other officers at the headquarters who gave her the nominations form after paying the nomination fee.
Mrs Rawlings later addressed journalists who had gathered.
She said the picking of the form and her candidature marked the beginning of taking Ghana back where it belonged and was whisked away by members of her campaign team and the ‘Savannah boys.’
She then went to the Ridge office of her husband’s which also houses their burnt house and formally handed over her form to Mr. Rawlings, the NDC founder.
An anxious looking Mr. Rawlings, who has already declared an unflinching support for his wife’s candidature, told journalists and Konadu’s teeming supporters “the task ahead will not be an easy one. We will be fighting all kinds. If we are not fighting the opposition, you have the enemy also on one hand and you have the traitor also on the other.”
Though the former President did not specifically name who that enemy or traitor was, he said, “We have to remain very vigilant,” noting, “as far as truth remains a weapon” Konadu would stop at nothing to ensure that the NDC was brought to the path of truth.
Incumbent President Mills is also expected to pick his nominations form tomorrow to enable him to contest the race which promises to be hot and keenly contested.
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