PPP, NVM, others unite to contest 2024 elections

The Progressive Peoples Party (CPP), New Vision Movement (NVM) and eleven other smaller groups have united to contest the 2024 elections.The group intends to present one Presidential Candidate and common parliamentary aspirants at the polls to compete fiercely with the two dominant parties in the country, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the National Democratic Congress (NDC).This was made known at the press conference organised by the Roundtable Dialogue (RTD) in Accra.The RTD, a social purpose think-tank, is facilitating the formation of an alternative political group to compete with the two major political parties in the 2024 elections.The eleven other groups are: Ghana Deserves Better, Osagyefo Youth Movement, Yere ko Kaan, Political Youth Advocacy Movement (PYAM), Action for Change, Moving Africa, GCP, GDM, CanYou, AISS and PANYMO.Until joining the RTD, the PPP had been to the polls on three consecutive times.The first was in 2012 where Dr Paa Kwesi Nduom, Founder of the party, polled 64, 36 2 votes to become third in a field of eight contestants. In 2016, Dr Nduom still represented the party and placed third again with 106,092 votes.The party went to the polls again in 2020 but with a different candidate in the person of Madam Bridgette Dzorgbenu, who polled 6,849, placing nineth.In all these elections, the party could not win any of the 275 parliamentary seats and as such did not have representation in Parliament.The NVM is a movement founded by Mr Kofi Koranteng, a disqualified Independent Presidential Candidate, in the 2020 elections.In December 2018, Mr Koranteng declared his intentions to contest the 2020 elections as an independent candidate.However, he and six other candidates were disqualified by the Electoral Commission (EC) due to forged signatures and manufacture of endorsees.The EC found out that 19 signatures endorsing Mr Koranteng were fake. This was confirmed by the Criminal Investigations Department of the Ghana Police Service.Nonetheless, Mr Koranteng declared his intention to contest again in the 2024 elections in 2021.A member of the Convention Peoples Party was also at the RTD meeting.But the GNA cannot confirm if the CPP is lacing its boots to join the 13 groups or it would contest separately.Meanwhile, Mr Ofosu Barko, Secretary, RTD, has encouraged all like-minded people to collaborate with the RTD and share their thoughts, resources, skills and strengths so that voters can be presented with a third alternative.He said the presence of several splintered political parties and independent candidates signaled that many people were disappointed in how the country had been ruled over the past 32 years.However, he noted that individual groups could not win the elections against the NDC and NPP hence the need for collaboration.Source: Ghana News Agency