Former Chief of Defense Staff of the Ghana Armed Forces, Brigadier-General (Rtd.) Joseph Nunoo-Mensah, has disclosed that the founder of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) late Jerry John Rawlings objected to the candidature of former President John Dramani Mahama as running mate of the party in 2008.
In an interview with Accra-based Joy News, he narrated that it took his intervention together with NDC stalwart, Victor Gbeho, for the late former president (Jerry John Rawlings) to rescind his objection.
According to Nunoo-Mensah, someone from the NDC recommended him to Mahama as the one who could change the mind of Rawlings.
Thus, Mahama visited him one evening where he (Brigadier Nunoo-Mensah) pledged to support him.
The retired army officer said despite his kindness to John Mahama, the latter turned his back on him once he got the opportunity to be running mate, then vice president and subsequently president upon the demise of John Evans Atta Mills.
“President Mahama…2008 when he was going to become running mate to Atta Mills but Rawlings said ‘No’. Somebody told him [Mahama] ‘go and see General Nunoo-Mensah’. I can swear by the Bible, Quran…ask him whether it happened.
“He came here and asked me to talk to late President Rawlings on his behalf. I promised I will do it. Ask Victor Gbeho whether what I’m saying is true or false.
“I went to see Rawlings with Gbeho to appeal to him to allow Mills to choose him as vice president [running mate]. [He] became President…he put an elbow through my chest, pushed me aside. You don’t do that,” Brigadier Nunoo-Mensah lamented.
Former President John Dramani Mahama partnered late John Evans Atta Mills for the 2008 elections where the NDC wrestled power from political arch-rivals, the New Patriotic Party.
Upon the demise of Atta Mills in 2012, John Mahama per constitutional requirement was sworn in as the new president and went ahead to win the year’s elections.
He however lost the 2016 and 2020 elections to NPP’s Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.
With 2024 elections approaching, the former president has expressed interest in contesting for the NDC flagbearership and eventually leading the main opposition party into the elections.
