Chairman of the NPP Council of Elders, Hackman Owusu-Agyeman, has issued a strong caution to individuals who leave the party and later seek to return, insisting that the practice is destabilising and must no longer be tolerated.

Speaking on Joy News’ PM Express on September 17, the former MP said repeated resignations and comebacks undermine the NPP’s progress.

“There are a few of them, without mentioning names, who resigned, then came back, then resigned, then came back. It’s not a child's game, so what the general secretary is saying makes a bit of sense. He’s saying that if you come, then some undertakings might be taken.

"You don’t come and disturb us. If you’ve gone, then if you want to stay where you are, stay, but if you come back, then we should have preconditions for you to do that thing,” he said.

He added that past leniency had only weakened the party.

“I think that in the past, we have been too liberal, lenient with people who have done that and eventually disturbed our forward march to better organisation and things like that. And then when they go, they don’t only shut their mouth, they begin to see all manner of things which never took place in the party.

"But people believe that, because they are coming from within, it’s almost like the fish coming from the water to say the crocodile is dead, and they have been quite a bit of a nuisance for me personally. And that’s my personal opinion.

"I think that if they come, the condition should be stringent, and people who have done it two, three times must not even be considered at all,” he stressed.

On the specific case of Alan Kyerematen, who resigned and contested the 2024 election independently, Hackman said the decision to accept him back would ultimately lie with the party, not him.

“I am not the party, I will have a personal view. So the party will have to discuss. I remember that Da Rocha, whom we all revere, when Alan resigned the first time, he said good riddance and he was the party chairman at that time.

"So I really don’t know when it comes, it will be discussed. And I believe that sometimes you begin to wonder whether, and I’m being very frank with you in this interview, you begin to wonder whether it was deliberately meant to affront and make us lose,” he remarked.

He criticised the circumstances under which Alan exited, saying there was no justification for his actions.

"And sometimes I wonder because there was absolutely no need... if you have a nationwide election and one person gets into a physical fight and then he says, because of that, I’m resigning.

"Well, if you want to form your own political party, have the courage to say, I am forming my political party. Don’t link that to the fact that the party was not able to protect you,” he stressed.

Hackman admitted Alan’s departure did harm the NPP in the 2024 elections.

“Well, even one vote is important, and he took a few thousand votes, especially from the Ashanti Region... Not only that, but they had the boys go on television and say all manner of things, insults and what have you, and people always saying ‘oh, they were with them once upon a time, so what they are saying is true,’ and it wasn’t helpful to us,” he explained.

The veteran politician was firm that such disruptions must not be entertained again.

“So if you want to come, you join a party, you have to behave yourself. And I don’t think that in future, we shall, well, I will not cast my vote for such a situation at all. In future, if you create problems for us, you go, I mean, we can go on, life goes on,” he said.

He argued that while politics is full of shifts, defectors should remain where they choose to go.