Constituency watch: Adentan earns ‘one term constituency’ tag

The Adentan Constituency in the Ga East District in the Greater Accra Region promises to be one of the interesting constituencies to keep an eye on during the December 7 general election.

Five new candidates are all battle ready to seek the people’s mandate to represent them in the next Parliament.

The candidates are Mohammed Muftao of the Progressive People’ Party (PPP), Yaw Buabeng Asamoah of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Mohammed Adamu Ramadan of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Razak Alhassan of the Convention People’s Party (CPP) and Hummi Sinare of the People’s National Convention (PNC).

One term constituency

The constituency, which has earned the tag “one-term constituency”, is notoriously known for changing legislators every election year, as no parliamentarian has retained the seat since its creation.

Located in the Adentan Municipal Assembly, this constituency was created in 2004 when the Electoral Commission divided the Ashaiman Constituency into two.

In 2004, Kwadjo Opare Hammond won the seat on the ticket of the NPP. Kojo Adu Asare of the NDC won it in 2008 and Emmanuel Nii Armah Ashie Moore also claimed it again for the NDC at the last election.

Having won the seat twice, it can be said to be an NDC seat but has become one of the key constituencies to pay attention to since the party has also changed parliamentary candidates in every primary it has held.

The first MP to represent the NDC in Parliament in the constituency was Kojo Adu Asare and even though he won the seat by 20,230 votes, representing 54.3 per cent of total votes; he was not maintained during the 2011 primaries.

He was replaced by Nii Ashie Moore who garnered 78 of total votes cast, while Adu Asare obtained only 17 votes.  Last year, Ashie Moore was defeated at the party’s primaries by Mohammed Adamu Ramadan who polled 2,387 votes while the incumbent only managed 1,130 votes.

Candidates working hard

Although the five candidates are working hard to win the trust of the electorate and eventually get their votes, the race appears to be a two-horse one between the NPP’s Yaw Buabeng Asamoah and NDC’s Mohammed Ramadan who, after launching their campaigns in the area, have engaged in house-to-house “evangelism” to make sure that their messages sink down to the people.

While 52-year-old Buabeng is campaigning on the message of change and hope for the people, Ramadan, 41, is hammering on unity and progress ahead of the election.

Ramadan, a management consultant and a presidential staffer at the Flagstaff House, comes from a political family. His father, Alhaji Ahmed Ramadan, is a former national chairman of the People’s National Convention (PNC) and his younger brother,  Abu Ramadan, a former youth organiser of the same party.

His sister, Samira, is married to the NPP running mate, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, but Mr Ramadan says he will put his family’s political history aside and rely on his own good record to win the seat for his party.

Yaw Buabeng Asamoah is a legal practitioner who lost the bid to represent the NPP in the 2012 general election in the Adentan Constituency to Frances Asiam. That attempt offered him a great opportunity to market himself to the electorate.

According to some members of the NPP in the area,  Asamoah will have to device strategies to overturn the votes in his favour to increase their hopes of recapturing the seat this year.

That notwithstanding, some of the electorate told the Daily Graphic that they were confident that the legal practitioner would close the score line and make it 2 – 2 for the NPP, while others too believe that relatively young manager may change it from 2 – 1 to 3 – 1 in favour of the NDC.

Only December 7 will tell!