No party official gets paid, it’s all voluntary service – Afriyie Ankrah

National Democratic Congress (NDC) General Secretary Aspirant, Elvis Afriyie Ankrah, says it is rather erroneous to expect a political party to pay its workers.

According to him, working for a political party is voluntary work and thus, people should not expect to receive a monthly salary as part of their job.

He was speaking in relation to some comments made by an NDC flagbearer aspirant, Dr. Duffuor, who said the base of the party was weakened due to lack of funds.

He has thus launched the Ahotor programme to help fund the party’s base through the provision of, among other things, stipends for party branch workers.

Reacting to the statement, Elvis Ankrah noted that while the gesture is commendable, it is not a requirement for party executives to be paid as work done is voluntary.

“The party is made up of volunteers, okay. We’re all volunteers, nobody pays us. I was a full-time lecturer at UPSA when I was Deputy General Secretary. Nobody gets paid, it’s voluntary,” he said on JoyNews’ PM Express.

He continued, “And this is how the party has been run on voluntary basis. If you want to introduce innovation, how do we fund our party? That is a conversation that has been going on continuous, and you know I’m an advocate for us looking at how we fund political parties, something that I’m very passionate about.

“But you cannot come to a general conclusion and say branch executives are not paid. When you’re campaigning for a position, you don’t advocate that you should be paid, it’s voluntary. It’s just like any other voluntary organization.”

He added that while it is “simplistic posturing” to expect that party branch executives get paid, there are various ways in which party branch managers can fund their activities.

“There’s a world of a difference between saying you want to help finance the party through various activities and saying party branch executives are not paid. So what about those who go and vote, should they be paid?

“So you see, it’s a very very simplistic posturing to take that we don’t the pay the branches, we don’t pay them.  But of course they do a lot of activities that require funding, that’s why at any given time when it comes to elections, people make donations, sell paraphernalia and those things.

“And indeed when he brought this project, we welcomed it that it was good. The only issue is the modalities; there have been misunderstanding about how it should be implemented. So I don’t think this should be the main focus of our discussion,” he said.