Two members of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) in the Ashaiman Constituency have declared their intention to contest the current Member of Parliament (MP) for the area, Mr Alfred Agbesi, in the parliamentary primaries of the party likely to be held in the last quarter of this year.
They are Mr Tony Afenyo, who contested the 2012 parliamentary election as an independent candidate, and Mr Ernest Norgbey, an official of the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO).
They told the Daily Graphic in separate interviews that Mr Agbesi had become unpopular, had failed to fulfil any of the promises he made and had “outlived his usefulness".
They said the NDC risked losing the parliamentary election in the constituency to the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) in 2016 if the parliamentary candidate was not changed.
Afenyo Mr Afenyo, a former Ward Co-ordinator, Branch Organiser, Branch Secretary, Branch Chairman and Constituency Vice Chairman of the NDC at Ashaiman, said Mr Agbesi promised in 2004 that after serving two terms as an MP, he would give way to another person to contest.
However, he said, the MP kept changing his word anytime primaries drew near, sometimes denying that he ever promised to give way to another after eight years. He said Mr Agbesi had failed to lobby for development projects for the community and facilitate employment for the youth.
According to him, Mr Agbesi had become so unpopular due to his non-performance and lack of charisma in the constituency that during the last election, he spent huge sums to buy votes.
"In Ashaiman, the NDC is so popular you don't have to buy votes. The fact that he bought votes is a clear writing on the wall that if we do not change him, we will lose.’’
Mr Afenyo said he (Afenyo) had the leadership qualities, had served the party since 1992, was very popular in the constituency and would garner more votes for the party in 2016.
Norgbey Mr Norgbey, for his part, said the grass roots of the party in the constituency had been neglected. "No jobs have been provided for the youth; people who had toiled for the party in the past have been neglected and we are lagging behind in development.
"We have to change the face of politics at Ashaiman. Agbesi has done his best but his best is not enough, " he said.
He said although he was an ordinary party member, he had done a lot to energise the party at the grass roots.
For example, he said he had provided 150 plastic chairs to 17 ward offices, as well as the constituency office, secured jobs at NADMO for 17 members of the party and small loans for women in the party to trade, among many other things.
Mr Norgbey said contrary to speculations, he had deep roots in the party and served as organiser of the Tertiary Education Institutions Network (TEIN) of the NDC in the 1990s when he was a student at the Takoradi Polytechnic.
He said he was also among party members who organised the Tamale Congress of the party in 2012.
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