Fourteen out of the 222 parliamentary candidates contesting the December 7 election on the ticket of the Convention Peoples’ Party (CPP) are people with disabilities (PWDs).
The party’s Presidential Candidate, Mr Ivor Kobina Greenstreet, who is on tour of the Greater Accra Region to introduce the party’s parliamentary candidates to the electorate, told the Daily Graphic that the party was giving additional support to all the PWDs contesting on its ticket.
“We are supporting them in terms of their mobility to get to the remotest parts of the country because moving around is more difficult for them. But we are inspired and encouraged by their desire to fight on the ticket of our party,” he said.
PWDs constituencies
In the Ashanti Region, one of the party’s candidates is visually impaired. Eastern Region has the highest number of PWDs contesting on the party’s ticket in Asuogyaman, Ayensuano, Atiwa West, Fanteakwa South, and Afram Plains North. In the Greater Accra Region, they are in Bortianor -Nglehie Amanfro and Krowor. Others are in the Sunyani West in the Brong Ahafo Region, Ajumako-Enyan-Essiam in the Central Region and in the Nkwanta South in the Volta Region.
The CPP presidential candidate, who has been confined to a wheelchair after a road accident on the Tema Motorway in 1998, enjoys massive support from the physically challenged community.
Not deliberate
He asserted that the party did not deliberately favour the PWDs but rather “they were strong on the ground but many of them have not felt brave enough to contest as parliamentary candidates before and having seen me as a person in a wheelchair, it gave them some vim, energy and confidence to come forward and contest.”
The CPP has been courting the physically challenged community for some time now. The party was the first to launch a braille version of its manifesto in 2012 and followed it with another this year and went another step with a sign language version of its manifesto.
The other party to have a physically challenged person in the parliamentary race is the National Democratic Congress (NDC’s), Dr Henry Seidu Daannaa, who floored the incumbent MP for Wa East, Mr Aminu Salifu, to put himself up for the seat in the upcoming election.
70 seats for CPP
Meanwhile, the party is projecting to win at least 70 seats out of the 275 in the next Parliament. Currently, the party has only one seat in Parliament, which it won in a by-election in Kunbungu in May 2013.
The seat was won by a 63-year-old development worker, Mr Amadu Yahya, when the Kumbungu seat became vacant as a result of the resignation of the former Member of Parliament, Alhaji Mohammed Mumuni, who took up the position of General Secretary in the African, Caribbean, and Pacific Group of States.
“We are praying that by the grace of God our hard work will be blessed and we will see some significant changes not only at the Presidency but in the Legislature as we move towards the December 2016 elections.”
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