The General Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Johnson Asiedu Nketia, says there were reasonable grounds for his party to reject the results of the 2016 election.
But he says the NDC decided not to in the name of preserving Ghana’s democracy.
John Dramani Mahama conceded the election to Nana Akufo-Addo after he polled 44.4% to Nana Addo’s 53.83% in what was the first election defeat by an incumbent president.
Speaking in an interview, the NDC General Secretary said: “we had every reason not to accept this result and to demand certain things but we decided to keep quiet.”
He reminded that EC had said its systems for transmitting the results electronically had been tampered with leading to a delay in the declaration.
But the commission is yet to provide any clarity on the incident over two years from the election.
“If it were NPP, I’m sure after that statement, even if Jesus Christ had descended, they wouldn’t have accepted defeat.”
Despite the NDC’s misgivings, Mr. Asiedu Nketia said the NDC was of the view that “this is Ghana and Ghana is bigger than everybody and the democratic credentials we have earned make all of us proud so let us concede and move along.”
Mr. Asiedu Nketia also noted that the NDC would have been unable to challenge the election regardless because it has not been gazetted.
“We thought that there will be a review of the elections. 2016 stands out as the only general election which has not been reviewed by the Electoral Commission and IPAC. As we sit here now, we couldn’t exercise any right to go to court or any place because the presidential results, the last time I checked, has still not been gazetted.”