Solomon Owusu of the Movement for Change believes the NPP’s defeat in the Akwatia by-election has dealt a significant blow to the party’s rebuilding efforts following its humiliating loss in the 2024 elections.
According to Owusu, the defeat has undermined the party’s strategies, including the selection of its flag bearer with the top-down approach, and has exposed issues such as monetisation and imposition of candidates among others.
“This election has also defeated all the principles that the NPP has set for themselves. It has collapsed everything. Be it the top-down approach, monetisation of the party, be it imposition,” he said Wednesday, September 3, 2025, on the BigIssue segment on TV3’s NewDay.
He also pointed out that the NPP lacked effective ground structures for the election, citing the national leadership’s heavy involvement in the constituency’s campaign as evidence of the local structures being in disarray.
“They didn’t have any structures on the ground. Clearly, the party was in disarray. That’s why in all the engagements that you saw, you saw the national executives leading the campaign. It had to be led by the constituency executives who know the dynamics of the constituency than anybody. But in this case, because the party structure is collapsed, because they are building roof to foundation no, it was not there.”
Owusu, a former NPP member, further attributed the party’s defeat to the imposition of a candidate, describing it as an anomaly in modern politics. “How on earth in the 21st Century that you have a by-election that you go and impose a candidate on the people? he questioned.
The by-election was held in Akwatia, a constituency in the Eastern region, following the death of their Member of Parliament, Ernest Yaw Kumi.
Over 50,000 registered voters were expected to cast their ballot to select a replacement for the constituency in the Tuesday, September 2, 2025 election.
The governing National Democratic Congress (NDC) put forward Bernard Bediako Baidoo as its candidate, while the New Patriotic Party (NPP) was represented by Solomon Kwame Asumadu.
The NDC’s Bediako Baidoo polled 18,199 of the 33,518 valid votes cast, as against 15,235 votes of the NPP’s Solomon Asumadu.
Akwatia by-election: ‘NPP needed the seat to rejuvenate their party’ – Solomon Owusu
