New Patriotic Party (NPP) chairmanship hopeful Awentami Paul Afoko has urged the party to drop guesswork for a research and data strategy to defend its seats by 2028.
Addressing the NPP Minority Caucus in Accra, Afoko said the party’s survival in the next general election would hinge on careful planning, evidence over instinct, and sharper communication. He told the Members of Parliament (MPs) the party needed to know exactly where it stood in every constituency before campaigning began.
Protecting what the party already controls must come first, he stressed. The NPP won 88 seats in the December 2024 elections and currently holds 87 of the 276 seats in Parliament, where it sits in opposition. “We now have 87 MPs. What we have, we protect,” he said.
Defence alone would not be enough, he added. Afoko said the party must deliberately target additional constituencies and widen its reach rather than settle for holding ground.
He argued that modern elections turn on intelligence rather than gut feeling, and pressed the NPP to invest in opinion polling, focus groups and rapid feedback systems that read voter mood early, before discontent hardens into support for rivals. He promised to lead that effort if given the mandate.
The proposal, he said, sits at the heart of a wider blueprint that can succeed only with the backing of the entire party, and he appealed to the caucus to throw its weight behind it.
Afoko, a former National Chairman suspended from the role in 2015, is contesting the chairmanship again ahead of the party’s internal elections. He faces a competitive field that includes Ashanti Regional Chairman Bernard Antwi Boasiako, known as Chairman Wontumi, former Energy Minister Boakye Agyarko and former General Secretary John Boadu.
