<<Print>>

Pollster and Managing Editor of the Daily Dispatch, Ben Ephson, has urged former President John Dramani Mahama to ditch his 2020 running mate, Professor Jane Naana Opoku-Agyemang, if he wants to win the 2024 elections.

According to him, failure on the part of the former president to heed his advice will see him face difficulties in the next elections.

Speaking on Accra-based Joy FM, the pollster opined that John Mahama lost the 2016 elections as a result of stepping on the toes of prominent factions within the National Democratic Congress.

He added that the former president should choose a different running mate for the 2024 elections.

Mr. Ben Ephson was commenting on a recent EIU report that said the NDC stands a greater chance of winning the 2024 elections if it presents a different candidate besides John Mahama to revitalise its base.

“In the aftermath of President Mills' death, Mahama in his anxiety to also set up his own faction…we’ve got the Rawlings faction, we’ve got the Mills faction…stepped on toes of people who had been known to be at the forefront of the Rawlings factions and the Mills faction.

“So by 2015, there had been a lot of disagreements between Mahama and leading members of these factions. Clearly, if Mahama wins the NDC flagbearership slot and he is not going to change his running mate, he’s going to have difficulties in 2024,” he said.

This is not the first time there have been calls for the change or criticisms directed at the 2020 running mate of the opposition NDC.

Dr. Obed Asamoah, a former Chairman of the party, indicated that she did not add anything to the fortune of the party in the 2020 elections.

“The lady who is a running mate to Mahama lost the Central Region in the last election, lost a whole constituency,” he said in an interview with Joy News in March.

Former National Organizer of the NDC, Yaw Boateng Gyan also described Naana Opoku-Agyemang as a “monumental flop”.

“The decision to make Naana Jane Opoku Agyeman as our running mate was very poor. She was a bad choice. She added nothing to our fortunes. I would say she was a monumental flop as running mate to President John Mahama,” he said.