Vice presidential candidate of the National Democratic Congress (NDC),Prof. Naana Jane Opoku-Agyemang has chastised the Communications Director of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP), Yaw Buaben Asamoa over his remarks against her selection by John Dramani Mahama as his running mate.
Mr. Yaw Buaben Asamoa at a press conference, after Naana Opoku-Agyemang was announced as the running mate to the NDC’s flagbearer, said Mr. Mahama’s selection of her as his running mate was an indication that he did not take the electorate seriously.
Justifying his position, Mr. Asamoa stated that Prof. Opoku-Agyemang’s performance when she was made the Minister of Education and a her decision to sign a petition for the release of the ‘Montie Trio’, who were convicted for threatening the lives of the then Chief Justice, a female and other supreme Court justices made her unfit for the vice presidential position.
But reacting to comments against her nomination as running mate to the NDC’s flagbearer, Professor Opoku-Agyemang said the statement by Mr. Asamoa was wrong and unnecessary.
“I think it’s a pity. It is a complete pity that anybody should say so especially from a political party that has women. I think that was wrong and that was unnecessary for him to say so,” she said in an interview on GhOne TV.
She asserted that the pronouncement by the NPP Communications Director is a campaign against the election of women contesting in the NPP.
“It was a wrong thing to say because you send the message to the people that they shouldn’t vote for women in his party,” she added.
Mr. Asamoa at the said press conference listed non-payment of transportation allowance to teachers and the implementation of a policy which stipulated a three month pay for teachers who had worked for several months as some of the decisions and policies undertaken during Prof. Opoku-Agyemang’s tenure in office as Minister of Education which make her unfit for the position as a vice presidential candidate.
He said “Naana Opoku Agyemang also introduced the practice of teachers working for two years without being paid and being restricted to being paid only three months back pay, no matter how long they had worked. This inhumane treatment meted out to Ghanaian teachers at the time was the brainchild of Prof. Naana Opoku Agyemang, the then Minister for Education. The cold hearted manner in which teachers were treated by Naana Opoku Agyemang cannot easily be forgotten.
He added that “when the ‘Montie Trio’ threatened death upon some Supreme Court Justices, including the then Chief Justice Theodora Georgina Wood, this newly appointed running mate to Mahama was one of those who joined the campaign for their release. we wonder what the message is that John Dramani Mahama is sending Ghanaians by picking Jane Naana Opoku Agyemang as his vice presidential candidate when her stewardship in the past brought such heartache to teachers and trauma to her colleague women.”
