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Ghana's former Ambassador to India, Sam Pee Yalley, has said that the candidature of ex-President John Dramani Mahama will not affect the fortunes of the NDC in the 2024 elections as intimated by an EIU report.

Sam Pee Yalley said that the prediction of the EIU (Economic Intelligence Unit) failed to account for the real factors that may lead to the National Democratic Congress (NDC) losing the upcoming general elections.

According to him, the only factors that can lead to the NDC losing the 2024 elections are the actions and inaction of the Election Commission (EC) that will favour the government and the use of the military to oppress voters.

“As for the NDC, it has already won according to the prediction (of the EIU), the second top-up is if they change their candidate the prospect of winning can even be higher. But we are saying that the people who are making these predictions have not taken account of the realities on the ground.

“… what will change this election is the conduct of the Electoral Commission, to conduct a Free, Fee and Transparent Election, that is a critical part. What will change the electoral fortunes in this country is the use of the military to attack voters. What will change elections in this country is when laws are made for the election and all of a sudden, they truncate it and bring new laws like what happened in the SALL (Santrokofi, Akpafu, Lipke and Lolobi traditional areas). These are the things we should look at but I don’t think that they did research in these fields I am talking about,” he said in a JoyNews interview monitored by GhanaWeb.

The former ambassador added that “I’m saying that on any nice day when all these factors I’m talking about are abated for a free and fair election, Ghanaians will vote for John Mahama because they have come to believe that all the lies and fabrications put on him are not true.”

The EIU, in its five-year forecast for Ghana released on April 13, 2022, said that the opposition party, NDC, has a higher probability to be victorious in the next general elections.

However, the EIU noted that the NDC should revitalize its prospects with a flagbearer other than former President John Dramani Mahama.

Also, the report said that the government under President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo is faced with numerous challenges, including unemployment, an economic downturn, and corruption among others which will fuel citizens' sentiments against the governing party.

"Our baseline forecast is that ongoing public dissatisfaction with the slow pace of improvements in governance-such as infrastructure development, job creation and easing of corruption-will trigger anti-incumbency factors and push the electorate to seek a change," the EIU report stated.