The former president used the NPP’s national delegates conference to frame the officer elections as the first real step towards the party’s 2028 comeback bid.
Former President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has asked delegates of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) to use their votes to pick national officers capable of healing divisions within the party and rebuilding its structures ahead of the 2028 general election.
He was speaking on Saturday, October 3, at the NPP's National Delegates Conference at the Baba Yara Sports Stadium in Kumasi, where the party is considering proposed amendments to its constitution before electing a new set of national executives.
The conference is the first major internal gathering since the party lost power, and the former president framed it as part of a wider reset. "This gathering represents an important step in our party's reorganisation," he told delegates.
Vote beyond factions
Akufo-Addo's central message was that delegates should set aside personal and group loyalties when they cast their ballots. He pointed to the conference theme, "One Party, One Purpose, United for Victory", and said he expected delegates to rise above sectional interests and choose leaders who can hold the party together "from the polling station to the presidency".
The new officers, he said, will have to work hand in hand with the party's presidential candidate, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, and with its parliamentary candidates, in the run-up to the 2028 presidential and parliamentary elections. Dr Bawumia served as Vice President under Akufo-Addo and was the party's flagbearer in the 2024 election.
'An arduous task'
The former president did not present the road back to power as an easy one. Rebuilding the NPP, he said, would demand energy, time, determination and loyalty from members, and would require real sacrifice.
Still, he said he believed the party could recover, drawing on its past wins. He expressed confidence that the NPP would return to government under Dr Bawumia's leadership, in the way it won power in 2000 and in 2016, and said such a government would advance the rule of law and the welfare of Ghanaians in line with the party's "development in freedom" motto.
He closed by wishing delegates a successful conference and describing himself as a committed servant of the party and of Ghana. The Ghana Report carried his remarks from the Kumasi conference.
Why it matters
For Ghanaians following politics from the United States and elsewhere, the Kumasi conference is worth watching for two reasons. First, the constitutional amendments on the table can change how the party selects leaders and runs its internal contests. Second, the officers elected this weekend will largely shape the NPP's organisation, messaging and fundraising, including among diaspora branches, through to the next national election.
Attention now turns to the results of the national officer elections and to how quickly the new executives move to settle the internal disagreements that followed the 2024 defeat.
