A flagbearer hopeful of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Kwabena Agyepong has warned executives not to attempt to force their preferred presidential candidate on the party.

In Mr Agyepong’s view, flagbearer hopefuls must be given a fair chance to campaign and be elected by the NPP delegates on their merit.

His comments follow suggestions by some NPP members that Vice President Dr Mahamudu Bawumia should be given the nod to replace President Akufo-Addo for the 2024 elections.

But speaking on the Citi Breakfast Show on Thursday, February 23, the former Press Secretary of former President John Kufuor said nobody deserves preferential treatment in the flagbearership race.

“Nobody is denying him [Dr Bawumia] his chance to contest, just that we in the NPP, we have a way of doing things. He just has to go around and talk to the party people and hope that he wins. But to try and force a coronation on us, that won’t happen. There would be no coronation in the NPP,” Mr Agyepong told host Bernard Avle.

Mr Agyepong also rejected assertions that the NPP only uses people from the Northern Region for votes but fails to give them a shot at the presidency.

According to him, the NPP had to bypass their rules and constitution to make Dr Bawumia the running mate of then-candidate Akufo-Addo.

“The party has a constitution, rules and regulations, you can’t even get on the ticket if you have not demonstrated membership for five years, but the party took a decision for Ohene Ntow to waive that [for Dr. Bawumia], create a card [for him] and on that day become a number two. It has never happened anywhere but [we did that] because of the respect that we had for candidate Akufo-Addo. So if you have been done such a big waiver, and you have served as Vice President and you consider that as using and dumping, whoever says that should stop that kind of talk. I don’t want to hear that”.