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Mr. Kofi Adams, Spokesperson of former President Jerry John Rawlings, says the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) reckons it will receive a tougher challenge from Nana Konadu Agyemang Rawlings than any of the other contestants vying for the NDC's flagbearer slot for the 2012 general elections.

According to Mr. Adams, who is also a Deputy General Secretary of the governing NDC, he has stumbled upon a document put together by the NPP which concluded that the former First Lady will put up a tougher fight than either Prof Mills or Ekwow Spio-Garbrah.

Mr. Adams, who was addressing NDC delegates in Ashaiman, was captured on a secret audiotape in which Hon. Michael Teye Nyaunu, the Campaign Coordinator for the former First Lady, was heard confidently claiming the Asantehene has endorsed and pledged his support, as well as that of his Kingdom, to the former First Lady�s bid to unseat President Mills as leader of the NDC party.

�I have laid hands on a document not done by us but by our political opponents. And they said in as far as they are concerned, they are winning the upcoming election. The concluding part of their survey before we opened our nomination was that, the most difficult candidate to beat was Nana Konadu, and not President Mills, Spio-Garbrah and Vice President Mahama. They have made up their mind that they are beating anybody that we bring. What it means is that, amongst all the candidates she is the only person who will be a threat and they have given reasons.

�Some of the reasons are that, she has not kept quiet in raising her voice in areas that she thinks the NDC Government is not doing right. So the negative campaign against a candidate is not possible on her. Everything that they have to say has been said already. What is there again to say against her?... And they also know, like my colleague said, and that is the one that is killing them most, that NPP benefits from two regions and a chunk of which is from the Ashanti Region and they know Ashantis will vote for their own (referring to Nana Konadu) and that will mean that their votes will dwindle� he noted.

NDC Founder and former President Jerry John Rawlings had earlier made a similar claim at the launch of his wife�s campaign that a survey by the Mills administration in the latter part of 2010 showed that Nana Konadu Agyemang Rawlings would have won the NDC�s internal primaries by 80% if the poll was conducted at the time.

The leadership of the NDC later denied the existence of such a survey report.
 
On the same tape on which Mr Kofi Adams claims the NPP views Nana Konadu Agyemang Rawlings as its greatest threat, Mr. Nyaunu claimed that Otumfuo Osei Tutu had told Nana Konadu he would rather support a fellow Asante royal than an Akyem native, a subtle swipe at the flagbearer of the opposition NPP, Nana Akufo-Addo, who is an Akyem. Mr Nyaunu�s claims have however been denied by the Asantehene�s Spokesperson, Osei Antwi.