Persons who contested former President John Dramani Mahama in the opposition National Democratic Congress’ (NDC) Presidential Primary have been advised to “form an alliance” to push for his ouster from the candidacy that would see him on the ballot paper in December 2020.
Mr Mahama beat off competition from six bigwigs of the party by a landslide victory that saw him win 95.25% of votes cast in all 275 constituencies and the party’s National Headquarters in February 2019.
Member of Parliament (MP) for Nadowli-Kaleo and 2nd Deputy Speaker of Parliament, Alban S.K. Bagbin, Former Trade Minister, Ekwow Spio-Garbrah, Prof. Joshua Alabi, Goosie Tanoh, Sylvester Mensah and Nurudeen Iddrisu squabbled over less than 5% of the votes.
But private legal practitioner, Maurice Ampaw believes that Mr John Mahama would be too busy frequenting the court to answer for his involvement in the Airbus bribery scandal and other issues of corruption to be able to campaign to win him the presidency in December.
“It is better that Mahama resigns from the flagbearership position; I call on Alban Bagbin, Spio-Garbrah, Sylvester Mensah and all the others who were beaten at the primaries by John Mahama; they should form an alliance and write to the NDC leadership, especially former President JJ Rawlings that the kind of evidence emerging from the Airbus saga puts Mahama and the party in a bad light”, he said in an interview with Kumasi-based Angel FM monitored by MyNewsGh.com.
Lawyer Ampaw says Mr Mahama would soon be “implicated” for his role in the Airbus bribery scandal by the legal process that has been triggered by the state through the Office of the Special Prosecutor; “so if by March or April Mahama is invited to the Special Prosecutor’s office on the allegation of corruption against him; he will start reporting and then he would be granted bail; can you imagine a presidential candidate who is reporting on criminal matters and charges and if by June-July you are charged that the evidence suggests that you are complicit, what would the party do”.
The former president has not personally commented on the Airbus bribery scandal in which various schools of thought have sought to link him and other members of his family in the case where some $5 million was said to have landed in wrong pockets in a contract to procure some aircraft for the Ghana Air Force, save a press statement by Marietta Brew Appiah Oppong that debunked the allegations against former government officials.
The former Attorney-general and Minister of Justice in the Mahama administration said, “the reports alleging that Airbus SE paid bribes during the administration of President John Evans Atta Mills and John Dramani are false, misleading and do not reflect the Approved Judgement”.
But Maurice Ampaw maintains that Mr. John Mahama is complicit and has refrained from commenting because, “if he opens his mouth the British will expose him big time and the Airbus officials are ready to expose him with video evidence if he dares come out to refute their allegations; as I speak Mahama has gotten high blood pressure, he has gone into hiding and experiencing sleepless nights because he knows the allegations are watertight”.
The Special Prosecutor, Martin Amidu who has opened investigation into the matter at the behest of the state has said, his office “has determined that the said referral and the deferred prosecution agreements and judgments accompanying them raise reasonable suspicion of the commission of corruption and corruption-related offenses of bribery of public officers and the use of public office by public officers for private profit, which are offenses falling within the mandate of this Office under the Office of the Special Prosecutor, Act, 2017 (Act 959)”.
–: mynewsgh.com
