Defeated NDC Aspirant To Contest Binduri Seat(5th December 2011 by Benjamin Xornam Glover)

One of the defeated candidates in the Binduri constituency primaries of the National Democratic Congress, Mr Stephen Atubiga, has announced his intention to contest the 2012 parliamentary elections as an independent candidate.

Mr Atubiga, one of the five to have contested the primaries, lost the contest with a difference of two votes to the eventual winner, Mr Ben Noah Azure.

He said his decision to go independent stemmed from what he described as some under-hand dealings by some individuals, namely the Deputy Upper East Regional Minister, Mrs Lucy Awuni and her husband, Mr Mark Anthony Awuni, a former MP for the area, who he alleged manipulated the process and that robbed him of the chance to represent his people in parliament.

However, the Deputy Regional Minister, Mrs Lucy Awuni, has denied the allegations, stressing that she does not work with the Electoral Commission. She said per the party’s constitution, she and her husband, a former MP, were mandated to vote and that was all they did at the primaries. “Like any of the delegate, I am entitled to one vote and I exercised it on the day of the election,” she said.

“My husband has gone to the primaries four times and only succeeded on one occasion. These are the traumas that come with election defeat. So if he (Atubiga) is traumatised, he should go seek for help somewhere else and desist from soiling my name,” she advised.

Mr Atubiga claimed his decision was supported by the constituency executive who had appended their signature to a document backing his independent candidature aspiration.

He named Messrs Paul Aiden, Moses Nti, Thomas Ndago, Alex Aweliga, Majeed Ayendago. Robert Ayaaba, James Asidiwaya and Seidu Musah, constituency secretary, organiser, treasurer, propaganda secretary, youth organiser and deputy youth organiser, deputy organiser and vice chairman, respectively, as those who support him. Others are Madam Margaret Abindaw, the
Constituency Women’s organiser and Mary Adam, the Deputy Women’s Organiser.

The announcement comes at the heels of a directive issued by the General Secretary of the ruling NDC, Johnson Asiedu-Nketia, that any party member interested in going independent during the 2012 parliamentary and presidential elections should count him or herself out of the NDC.

The disgruntled member who returned from the United States of America to contest the polls said his stance was motivated by the numerous appeals made to him by his constituents who saw him as a viable candidate to wrest the seat from the incumbent NPP candidate, Mr Stephen Yakubu.

He said apart from rejuvenating the party in the constituency, he had managed to woo members of the party who defected to other parties to return to the NDC. Again, he had opened a bank account for the party and this had endeared him to the ordinary person in the party.

He described the candidate elect as not marketable and a non-winnable person, hence the need to go as an independent candidate to fulfil the desires of the people who saw him as a viable candidate capable of wresting the seat from the NPP. He, however, insisted that he would canvass for votes for the NDC presidential candidate, President John Atta Mills.

When he was reminded of the warning by the party’s general secretary on the issue of independent candidates, he said, “the party needs us to win elections than we need them. Yes, we respect rules and regulation but sometimes we have to take a stand to prove our point.”

Mr Atubiga also called for the immediate removal of the deputy regional minister from office for failing “to bring development to the constituency where she hails from” but the Mrs Awuni refuted the claimed, stressing that her mandate as deputy regional minister stretched across the region and was not limited to the Binduri area. “Since coming into this office, I have helped a lot of people all over the region,” she maintained.