Vice Chairman of the 2024 Bawumia Campaign Team, Nana Akomea, has raised alarm over growing internal divisions within the New Patriotic Party (NPP), cautioning that unresolved tensions between rival camps could seriously compromise the party’s chances in the 2028 general elections.
Speaking in an interview on Joy FM on Thursday, July 17, 2025, Akomea expressed deep concern about the persistent factionalism that has gripped the party, particularly in the aftermath of the 2024 defeat. He warned that continued infighting among loyalists of former flagbearer aspirants is weakening party cohesion at a critical time when unity should be the top priority.
“This year, we took the unusual step of including all former contenders, including Kennedy Agyapong, in the thank-you tour,” he said. “It was meant to show party unity, but unfortunately, it turned into a contest of influence at every stop.”
According to Akomea, what was intended as a symbolic show of reconciliation quickly descended into a political tug-of-war, with each stop of the tour becoming a battleground for rival supporters seeking to upstage one another. Carefully orchestrated displays of loyalty, he said, undercut the spirit of the tour and magnified internal fractures instead of mending them.
“If we don’t rein in these rival camps, we are going to lose credibility among Ghanaians. And that has serious implications for our chances in 2028,” he warned.
He cited a particularly tense moment in Bantama in the Ashanti Region, where rival supporters nearly clashed, forcing party leaders to reconsider how the tour was being managed. According to him, these flare-ups are not isolated events but symptoms of deeper unrest within the party.
Akomea also linked the party’s internal strife to the recent arrest and detention of Ashanti Regional Chairman, Bernard Antwi-Boasiako, widely known as Chairman Wontumi. He alleged that internal power plays may have delayed efforts to secure Wontumi’s release.
“There’s a belief that one flagbearer aspirant’s attempt to secure bail was delayed to allow another aspirant to take the credit,” he claimed. “If that’s even half true, then it shows how far the division has gone.”
The thank-you tour itself had to be postponed earlier this year to allow the party’s internal review committee time to finalise its report on the 2024 electoral defeat. Akomea said the tour was designed to reassert party solidarity, especially by presenting a unified front with all former flagbearer hopefuls onboard. But in practice, the exercise revealed just how fragmented the party has become.
“The intention was noble, but the conduct on the ground tells us that unity cannot just be performed, it must be built through discipline and shared purpose,” he said.
He urged the party’s leadership to take urgent steps to rebuild internal trust, streamline communication, and discourage personalised campaigns that only deepen divides and alienate swing voters.
“We have to ask ourselves: what does the Ghanaian voter see when they look at us now? Unity, or chaos?” he asked pointedly.
Akomea contrasted the NPP’s disarray with what he described as a more disciplined and focused approach by the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC), which is also on a thank-you tour. “You didn’t hear about this kind of jostling in the NDC,” he said. “But with us, every action is seen through the lens of who supports whom.”
With the road to 2028 now taking shape, Akomea’s warning serves as a stark reminder that without real reconciliation, the NPP’s internal divisions could ultimately become its undoing.
