A Former Attorney General and chairman of the opposition New Patriotic Party's constitution committee, Nii Ayikoi Otoo says the NPP would have itself to blame if it takes any punitive action now against its members who may have breached one election regulation or the other. According to him, although many people in the party have already breached regulations regarding the endorsement of particular candidates over others, cracking the whip now will only increase tensions and affect the party negatively in the future. There have been increasing reports of some party executives openly endorsing certain candidates in the NPP presidential race contrary to binding party regulations. For instance, the Greater Accra Regional Chairman, Ishmael Ashittey together with his constituency executives publicly declared support for Nana Akufo-Addo’s bid, prompting the party Chairman Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey, who himself has been accused of showing preference to one of the 5 candidates to issue a statement condemning the action. The NPP has reminded all executives at constituency, regional and national levels to desist from openly endorsing a presidential candidate before the primaries, since it amounts to a breach of the party’s rules, which attracts sanctions. However, the party has not been able to bring any executive to book over a breach of the rule. Speaking on the Point Blank segment of Eyewitness News on Citi FM, Nii Ayikoi Otoo said it was best for the party not to crack the whip on any one at this time. “It is about winning elections, how do we win elections and come back in 2012? Systems will endure but remember that the main concern of any political party is to win political power otherwise we should be doing NGO. We are looking for a winnable candidate for 2012, come August 7 and we should all focus on that one. There is no point dividing our ranks at this stage, disciplining people, cracking whips; all we want is how to win political power.” He said. “If you’ve gone through elections before, you will find that the end of the primaries is when the actual work begins, those who lose can work seriously against the person who won the primaries and if they do that, you are definitely going to lose because these are your own people going round and talking about you, vilifying you and damaging your reputation to the other side and it happened in 2008, I was a candidate and I know what I’m talking about and it is not easy.” He added. Source: Citifmonline/Ghana