Bantama NPP Embraces Amendments

NEW PATRIOTIC Party (NPP) polling station executives in the Bantama constituency have enthusiastically welcomed proposed amendments to the party�s constitution. Against this backdrop, constituency executives who would be attending the August 22 Extraordinary Conference have resolved to vote en bloc for their adoption. This remarkable feat was recorded over the weekend at Ampabame, a suburb of the constituency when the party�s Ashanti Regional Parliamentary caucus met polling station executives to educate them on the proposed changes. After attentively listening to the group led by Elizabeth Agyeman, the Chairperson and MP for Oforikrom, the over 300 executives who gathered for the occasion collectively voted to approve them. Speaking at the function, Dr Akoto Owusu Afriyie, MP for Kwadaso and a key advocate of the amendments stressed they were the best thing to ever happen to NPP. He said the party would be better positioned than before to recapture political power from the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) in the next general elections should the anticipated changes be approved and adopted. Dr Afriyie thus enjoined the gathering to spread the amendment message with the view of galvanizing overwhelming support for it. Hon. Agyeman popularly known as �People�s mother,� Hon Isaac Asiamah, MP for Atwima Mponua and Hon Richard Akuoko Adiyiah, MP for Ahafo Ano North all took turns to take the gathering through some of the proposed changes. Portions they touched on included the enlargement of the party�s Electoral College for the election of a presidential candidate and other national officers and the restriction of only three candidates for the flagbearership race at any given time. Other changes being sought after are the enlargement of the party�s Electoral College from the present 2,000 to about 140,000. The polling station executives went into spontaneous wild jubilation when they were told they would become part and parcel of the Electoral College if the proposals were adopted. Kwabena Kokofu, the Constituency Chairman thanked the MPs on behalf of the polling station executives for spending quality time to explain to them the significance of the situation. He assured the constituency was ready to vote in favour of the improvements. NPP�s National Executive Council (NEC) is seeking to make vital changes to the party�s current constitution as part of efforts to revitalize the party and enable it take back power from the ruling NDC. At the conference, five delegates each from the 230 constituencies will vote for or against it. According to the dictates of NPP�s constitution, amendments could only be adopted as a legal working document when two thirds of delegates vote in favour of it.