Abetifi MP and New Patriotic Party (NPP) flagbearer hopeful, Dr Bryan Acheampong, has attributed the New Patriotic Party’s (NPP) 2024 electoral defeat to what he described as the tribal dynamics surrounding the candidature of Dr Mahamudu Bawumia.

Speaking to party members on Saturday, August 23, the former Minister for Agriculture said the party’s choice of flagbearer alienated sections of the electorate in northern Ghana.

Dr Acheampong argued that while former Presidents John Agyekum Kufuor and Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo won strong backing across northern constituencies, the 2024 race was undermined by historical rivalries.

“President Kufuor won all NPP votes in Kusasi and President Akufo-Addo also did the same thing, but because the fight is between two tribes (Mamprusis and Kusasis) and we elected a flagbearer from one of them, we lost from Oti Region, Upper East, Upper West and the Northern Region,” he explained.

According to him, the defeat was not necessarily a reflection of Dr Bawumia’s competence or personal failings, but rather the timing and political circumstances.

“We lost all our seats because of the candidate we presented [Dr Mahamudu Bawumia], and he could be a victim of circumstance and not his fault, but the timing didn’t favour him,” he said.

Dr Bawumia, who served as Ghana’s Vice President from 2017 to 2025, was the NPP’s flagbearer in the 2024 general elections.

Dr Acheampong, who is currently in the race to lead the NPP into the 2028 elections, maintained that the party must take lessons from the 2024 outcome.

He called on members to be strategic in their decision-making to ensure that the party presents a candidate capable of uniting its base and reclaiming power from the National Democratic Congress (NDC).