By Yaw Ansah, GNA
Accra, Oct. 16, GNA – The Centre for Social
Democracy (CSD-Ghana) in partnership with the National Democratic Congress
(NDC) and Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) is to organize pre-election candidate
debates for aspirants in the upcoming NDC National Executive Elections.
The novelty, which starts on Wednesday,
October 17, seeks to promote a healthy competition among aspirants to
explicitly explain their idea to delegates and also engender internal democracy
within the NDC.
The members of the Debate Advisory Board are
Mr Lee Ocran, Professor Jane-Naana Opoku-Agyemang, Dr Benjamin Kumbuor, Dr.
Michael Kpessah-Whyte, and Dr. Zenator Rawlings.
Speaking at the launch of the debate in Accra
on Monday, Mr Michael Nii Abbey, Programmes Coordinator at FES Ghana, said the
debate sought to test the leadership capabilities of contestants and their
ability to hold their own against one another and communicate coherent ideas in
connection with the thematic issues.
He noted that it would test the candidate’s
composure under pressure and ability to articulate their thoughts, to the rank
and file of the Party
Mr Abbey said the debate, would test the
ability of candidates on characteristics including meanness of spirit, ability
to listen, willingness to improvise, humour and goodwill.
“The debate will not place a premium on
articulateness. This is because not all well-spoken candidates, who could speak
most clearly and most quickly, think more clearly,” he said.
“There are many people who think clearly but
speak slowly while acting quickly; this debate is equally interested in such
candidates. It seeks to unravel the ability of candidates to withstand the
challenges of the position they are seeking.”
Touching on the partnership, he stated that
participation in the debate would be strictly by invitation and that the Debate
Technical Committee of CSD would work out the modalities for the debate and
would be validated by the Debate Advisory Board.
He said to reach many people the debate would
be widely publicized via radio, televised and streamed live on Facebook.
Mr Abbey recalled that globally, pre-election
candidate debates were becoming an integral part of democracy and that over
sixty countries across the world had developed a debate tradition.
Mr Bede Ziedeng, Acting Director of Elections
of the NDC, said the Party, as a social democracy, was in the process of
reorganization and rebranding toward Election 2020.
He said, “Elections sometimes turned
acrimonious and was easy for a contestant to involve issues that were not
essential to the campaign. Since the Party was formed in 1992 it had not
organised internal debate such as this. This is a novelty that we have
embraced”.
GNA