The Editor of the Herald Newspaper, Larry Dogbey says the silence of the outgoing Minority Leader in Parliament, Haruna Iddrisu on his reshuffle is fueling the wrangling in the National Democratic Congress (NDC).
He opines that Mr. Iddrisu holds the key to resolving the division among MPs and other party members.
Mr. Dogbey believes Haruna’s silence is not ‘dignifying’ and not the best at this time.
Speaking on The Big Issue on Citi TV, Mr. Dogbey said, “Haruna Iddrisu’s silence is actually fueling a lot of things. He cleverly avoided talking about the changes [when he issued a disclaimer on Facebook]. Couldn’t that be deliberate? I think Haruna holds the key towards resolving this particular matter. His silence is not helping matters at all. People think that his silence is dignifying, no, his silence is not dignifying, it’s rather fueling matters”.
He entreated Mr. Iddrisu who has gone through the mill to pull the brakes by joining forces with Ato Forson, the new Minority Leader to calm matters down.
“Ato Forson and Haruna are very good friends, so they should know what to do to solve the issue. Haruna should try to pull the brakes by saying he’s the big guy who needs to bring people up. These are individuals with political ambitions, even a child is aware that Haruna has a presidential ambition,” he said.
According to him, the Tamale South MP has some clout among his constituents and that his chances of winning the party’s parliamentary elections won’t be affected by the reshuffle.
“Unless Haruna Iddrisu has become unpopular in Tamale South that a change will affect his chances of winning his seat, he has some clout out there, and so whether he’s in leadership or not, Haruna should be able to sail through easily at the primaries,” the Editor of the Herald Newspaper asserted.
He said NDC members are acting as if the party is ‘leaderless or weak’ and called on them to come together to solve the issue.
“One moment we hear people saying we can’t make nobody somebody, we can’t make a non-entity a hero. This whole thing is driven by emotions. I think that it’s just portraying the NDC as just a very weak institution, as leaderless. NDC members are not painting a very good picture of themselves,” Mr. Dogbey said.
The Editor of the Herald Newspaper suggested that NDC members going against the party’s rules should be punished.
“Those going against the party rules should be sanctioned,” he opined.
Background
The NDC earlier this week reshuffled its leadership in Parliament replacing Minority Leader Haruna Iddrisu with Dr. Cassiel Ato Forson.
Emmanuel Armah-Kofi Buah, MP for Ellembelle also replaced Ketu North MP, James Klutse Avedzi as the Deputy Minority Leader while Kwame Governs Agbodza replaced Asawase MP, Muntaka Mubarak as the Minority Chief Whip.
Some MPs signed a petition to reject the decision of the party.
Another set of MPs also petitioned the leadership of the NDC to ignore calls for the reshuffling to be reversed.
The Council of Elders of the party in a statement on Saturday, January 28, 2023, admonished the aggrieved members of the party, MPs and party leadership to refrain from further public pronouncements.