The Northern Regional Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Alhaji Alhassan Imoro Issifu Umar has blamed internal wrangling and complacency for the party’s defeat in the Kumbungu bye-elections Tuesday. According to him, the party leadership in the region thought the election would be a cool chop and therefore failed to address the internal wrangling in the party. The Kumbungu seat became vacant following the appointment of then NDC MP, Alhaji Mohammed Mumuni as the Secretary-General of the African, Caribbean and Pacific States. However, the Convention People’s Party (CPP) candidate who went into the election as an underdog was pronounced winner by the Electoral Commission. Mr. Amadu Moses Yahaya polled 13,029 of the total vote cast to beat his closest contender, Alhaji Imoro Yakubu Kakpagu of the NDC who polled a little over 11,000 votes. This means, the CPP has regained the only seat it had in Parliament after its Chairman; Samia Nkrumah lost her seat to the NDC in the 2012 election. Speaking on Citi news Wednesday, Alhaji Issifu Umar said the NDC has itself to blame for the defeat. He noted that the incumbency advantage was what deluded them into thinking that there was no need for any rigorous campaign to market their candidate. "We have to blame ourselves because we were a bit complacent; even National Executive Committee (NEC) thought that it was a done deal for us" he added. The NDC Northern Regional Secretary also attributed the defeat to the refusal of some aggrieved party members to join the campaign which he claims gave their opponent the leeway to operate in the constituency. Alhaji Issifu Umar observed that the NDC has learnt it lessons the hard way but will ensure the party wins back the sit in subsequent elections.