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The New Patriotic Party will tomorrow, Saturday January 25, 2014, hold regional congresses across the country to elect ten executives for each region, to steer the affairs of the party for the next four years and, in particular, lead the party�s effort to return to power in the 2016 general elections. Voting is expected to commence around 9am, under the supervision of the Electoral Commission, while the outcome of the elections is expected to be known by 5pm the same day. The elections for regional executives will then be followed by the widely anticipated national executive elections on March 1, 2014. According to Martin Adjei-Mensah Korsah, the party�s Director of Elections, enough preparations have been done to ensure the smooth conduct of the elections in all the regions. Mr Adjei-Mensah Korsah told a section of the media yesterday that the party had completed the printing of ballot papers while the EC was in the process of distributing them to the various voting centres in the regions. He added that the issue of the necessary accreditation for the media, the security and the delegates had been well taken care of already. According to him, as of yesterday, the party was about 98 per cent through with the required preparations, expressing the hope that with the collaboration of the delegates and candidates, as well as other stakeholders, the elections would end successfully. The Party has already held peaceful elections at the polling station and constituency levels and it is expected that the regional executive elections will also be conducted in a peaceful and successful manner. Tomorrow�s regional executive elections will be held simultaneously across the country, with about 267 candidates seeking the mandate of about 5,000 delegates to be elected to one of the 100 vacant positions, 10 in each region. Views sampled from some of the delegates across the country indicate that their choices of candidates for the various positions will be largely influenced by the tract records and competence of the candidates, as well as their loyalty to the cause of the party, with special emphasis on what they have to offer to help the party win the 2016 general elections. The list of delegates for each of the 10 regions include NPP Members of Parliament from the region, members of the constituency executive committee, 10 patrons from the region, 10 members of the regional Council of Elders, a representative from each branch of the Tertiary Students Confederacy of the party in the region and living founding members who were present at the time the party was being registered and its documents were being filed at the Electoral Commission. Attracting the keenest attention is the election in the party�s stronghold of Ashanti Region, where Kwame Osei Prempeh, former MP for Nsuta-Kwaman-Beposo and former deputy Attorney-General and Minister for Justice is engaged in a fierce battle with the party�s former constituency chairman for Bosomtwe, Barnard Antwi-Boasiako, affectionately called Wumtumi, for the regional chairman position. The core message of Mr Osei-Prempeh, who enjoys massive support from his former colleagues in Parliament, who are said to be actively campaigning for him, is that he is politically mature enough to exercise the required amount of influence over all the major actors in the party, having served in government as a deputy minister and MP for three terms. His counterpart, Wumtumi, on the other hand, believes his material wealth and radical approach to political campaigning put him in a better position to win the region massively for the NPP in the 2016 elections, by putting a stop to the NDC�s electoral manipulations. Another region where political pundits are watching with keen interest is the Eastern region, where the incumbent Chairman, Dr Samuel Yaw Annoh, is facing a stiff challenge from Kinston Kissi, a former Member of Parliament for Akwatia. Yaw Gyekye Amoabeng, the immediate past chairman, who was initially in the race for the chairmanship, withdrew from the contest, ostensibly to shore up support for Mr Kissi. The situation appears to be the same in the Brong-Ahafo Region, where Kwadwo Yeboah-Fordjour, a popular Sunyani based businessman, is staging a comeback for the chairmanship position he previously occupied, from the incumbent Kwaku Asomah-Cheremeh, a private legal practitioner. Others in the race for the chairmanship are Kwame Twumasi Awuah, former Municipal Chief Executive for Sunyani, and Kwaku Adjei, former executive member of the Ghana National Association of Teachers. The same can be said about the Greater Accra regional contest, where the incumbent chairman, Ishmael Ashittey, is facing what can be described as a contest of his life to retain his position, against a stiff opposition from the famous George Isaac Amo, a former Member of Parliament for Ayawaso West Wuogon. Also attracting equal interest is the contest for the chairmanship in the Western Region, where Dickson Atta-Nketsiah, a 55- year old Takoradi-based pharmacist, is moving heaven and earth to unseat the incumbent Nana Owusu-Ankomah, whose administration has been accused of reducing the party�s parliamentary seats in the region by a significant number. Another contestant in the chairmanship race is Paa Payne. The situation is the Northern region is not different, following the determination by the incumbent Secretary, Dr Clifford Braimah, to unseat the man he has worked with for the past four years as the chairman of the region, Alhaji Haruna Tia. The contest is the Volta region is also another one of great interest, with former Volta Regional Minister, Kwasi Owusu-Yeboa, former Hohoe District Chief Executive, John Peter Amewu, and a retired Regional Director of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, Julius Kwami Ametefe, in a fierce battle for the regional chairmanship. The incumbent Ken Nuworso is not seeking re-election. Speaking with the New Statesman yesterday, Kwaku Ampratwum-Sarpong, a former Deputy High Commissioner to India, who is the chairman of the elections committee in the Ashanti Region, urged all the contestants to put the party�s collective agenda to win the 2016 above their individual ambitions and conduct themselves in a manner that will not jeopardise the party�s unity and cohesion after the elections. �This advice particularly goes to the contestants in the Ashanti region, in view of the fierce nature of the contest. At the end of the day, we will all have to come together to spearhead our party�s effort to win the 2016 elections, as the surest stronghold of the NPP,� he added.