It would be recalled that in a recent petition sighted by a1radioonline.com, 33 regional communication team members of the New Patriotic Party in the Upper East Region explained that Peter Ayinbisa’s appointment was done without proper consultation, as has been the norm for the party.
“Article 7 section 4 a) of the party’s constitution gives the Regional Executive Committee the right to, within fourteen (14) days after their election, appoint qualified persons as Regional Officers who are required to be appointed under section 2 of same Article including the position of the Regional Communication Officer.”
“This, it said must be done based on a broader consultation with the National Executive Committee. However, we had a situation whereby people were appointed without prior application to the tenets of good communication. Ignoring the simple fact of consulting the stakeholders in the Communication Team, many times, ended the Regional Officers appointing persons who do not reside within the capital or never had the time to play that role effectively and most times, this breeds a lot of conflict within the communication wing in the region, portions of the petition read.
The Regional Secretary of the NPP, Elvis Awonekai has thus responded to the earlier petition. The response was contained in a letter sighted by a1radioonline.com.
He said while they were not the addressees of the previous petition, it was important that the party’s Regional Executives took the time to respond to the content of the petition and set the record straight.
“The Upper Fast Regional Executives have been served with a copy of the above petition. Although we are not the addressee of the petition, we deemed it necessary to respond to same in order to set the records straight and to educate the petitioners in our collective resolve to serve our great party, God and Country.”
“The petition was wrongly addressed as the Regional Executives are not answerable to the National Communications Director in the discharge of our constitutional mandate humbly placed on us following the 28th May, 2022 Regional Executives Elections. Therefore our response to this petition should and ought to be construed as a way of setting the records straight but not an endeavour to legitimize the petition since in carrying out our functions we are by no means answerable to the National Communications Director,” portions of the 7-paged letter read.
Mr Awonekai did not take kindly to the content of the petition explaining that the wording was unpalatable.
“The choice of words in the heading of the petition are highly incendiary and manifestly confrontational as a reading of the entire petition has not and cannot demonstrate the appropriateness of this choice of words – “bad faith” and “political vendetta”. We never promised the Team any appointment for which reason the bona fide of the Regional Communications Officer’s appointment can be called into question. The petition, ab initio, is therefore written in a vain attempt to set us on a collision cause with the Regional Communication Team without any justifiable basis. This unsolicited invitation will obviously be refused by us as we strive to execute our mandate with all hands on deck.”
“In the appointment of the Seven (7) appointed Regional Officers as specified in clauses (2) and (8) of Article 9 of the NPP Constitution, the Regional Executive Committee does not feature at all. Article 7 relied on by the petitioners deals with constituency organization but not regional. Still on paragraph 4 of the petition, there were consultations, lobbying and engagements made prior to the appointment of the Regional Communications Officer. It must be put on record that at least five (5) known members of the Communications Team – petitioners made one contact or another lobbying as it were as individuals for the position of the Regional Communications Officer.”
Mr. Awonekai reminded the striking communication team members that while there may have been some coincidences appointing people to serve as communication directors from the communication team, it has never been obligatory.
“It has never been a convention that a Communications Officer must necessarily be a member of the Regional Communications Team. Whenever there was such a coincidence, it was mainly because it was in line with Clause (3) of Article 9 of the NPP Constitution which reads.”
Source: A1radioonline.com|101.1MHz|Mark Kwasi Ahumah Smith|Ghana
