Kojo Bonso stokes fire in NDC with presidential ambition

The intended plan by Kojo Bonsu, former Mayor of Kumasi, to challenge John Dramani Mahama for the 2024 presidential slot of the opposition National Democratic Party (NDC) seems not to have gone down well with some loyalists of the former President.

Mr Kojo Bonsu, in a recent interview with Citi TV, claimed that he stands a better chance of winning the 2024 elections for the NDC than Mr Mahama “because I have not been sullied”.

“He! Mr Mahama is a great gentleman, speaks very well, very affable, but he has been put in the mud so much. They have tagged him with corruption, women affairs, and we in the NDC have not been able to defend him,” he said.

No decorum

However, an aide and loyalist to former President Mahama, Gidwin Edudze Tamakloe, has slammed the former Kumasi Mayor, saying it is not wise for a man of his stature to say such things about his fellow man.

“A man who stands in public and accuses his fellow of being promiscuous, is such a man wise? From his statement, that is what he is claiming, and I am saying a wise man does not stand in public and accuse his fellow of philandering. How about himself? Is it men that he likes?” he questioned.

While recognising Kojo Bonsu’s constitutional right to contest the NDC flagbearership race, Edudze Tamakloe urged the former Mayor to go about his business in “a very civil manner with some decorum.”

Also taking the former Mayor to the cleaners is Baba Jamal, the NDC’s Deputy Director of Legal Affairs.

Speaking in a radio interview yesterday, he warned Mr Kojo Bonsu against his acid comments about the leadership of the NDC.

Moral test

According to him, Mr Kojo Bonsu will flatly fail the test when it comes to women and corruption in government.

“We know what happened under his reign as Mayor of Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly,” he said, adding that it would be in the interest of Mr Bonsu to be careful with his utterances in the run-up to the NDC’s presidential primary.

“We know ourselves as members of the NDC, and we know what he, Mr Bonsu, did in office as Mayor of KMA. As KMA boss, what didn’t he do that warranted his problems with the chiefs and people of the Kumasi metropolis”? Mr. Jamal quizzed.

He said Mr Bonsu cannot make it to the top of the standards he is seeking to set for the other aspirants in the NDC flagbearership race.

“The rules of the NDC are clear,” Baba Jamal stated, adding that “you don’t have the right to put somebody down as part of the acts to win the race.”

According to Baba Jamal, “if the former President [Mahama] should also come out with some of the dealings of Mr. Bonsu as Mayor, as well as his decision to go and bring some phony consultants into the country, it will not serve the interest of the party, going into the 2024 general elections”.