A founder”ˆmember of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Dr Nyaho Nyaho-Tamakloe, has said the NPP is Ghana’s only truly democratic party, and leadership decisions and pronouncements must not be made without consulting the grassroots.

He said proposals that provoked the mistrust of the rank and file must be avoided at all cost if the party’s integrity and unity were to be safeguarded.

Dr Nyaho-Tamakloe, who is also Ghana’s former Ambassador to Serbia and Montenegro, told the Daily Graphic in an interview that “as I argued in my memoirs, the NPP brand will continue to be viable, irrespective of the results of the recent election petition.”

He said Ghanaians continued to cry out for NPP’s visionary politics, and the party was still capable of capturing power, if they learnt from their past mistakes and listened more to the grassroots.

“We must remember that the reforms adopted by the party’s national delegate’s conference in 2009, gave the grassroots a stronger voice in the party’s decision making. Those gains must not be reversed,” he stated.

According to Dr Nyaho-Tamakloe, the NPP was a party of tradition and consultation, not a party of revolution.

While a new generation of leadership is emerging, the older generation has a role to play in mapping the way forward for the ensuing party unity, he stated.

He said that personalities with gravitas such as former President J.A.K Kufuor and Nana Addo-Dankwa Akufo-Addo, who had effectively led the party as flag bearers and former National Chairman S.A Odoi-Sykes, should be given a more active role in decision making.

“They have the respect of the grassroots and can be counted on to give wise counsel that reflects the will of the grassroots,” he stated.

Given the party’s showing in Election 2012, Dr Nyaho-Tamakloe said the current national executive must also be prepared to do the honourable thing by giving way to a new crop of executives.

“We need to develop a culture of recognition in this country,” he concluded.