How the NDC wins the Debates and the NPP wins the Communications

 

 

Over the past two elections, the two dominant political parties in Ghana have introduced the phenomena of political communication as a means of informing and winning the Hearts and Minds of the Ghanaian voters.

The Media in Ghana has also beffitngly given the phenomena an impetus buy providing their platforms on daily basis.They do so in the form News Paper Reviews and Political Talk Shows.

In 2016, the NPP defeated the incumbent NDC government in spite of the latter’s massive infrastructure achievements and socio economic developments.

The NDC even published an elaborate document in which they factually exhibited their achievements in pictures yet the NPP won the elections with close to one million votes in the Presidential Elections and almost covered two thirds of Parliamentary space items of their numbers.

In 2016, the NPP MP or Assin Central accidentally chanced on a paragraph in the Auditor General’s Report to the Public Accounts Committee.

In this Report the Auditor General had remarked to the effect that, the NDC had paid a business man Alfred Woyome some unjustified amount in the form of a Judgment Debt.

The NPP decided to use this as thier sole Campaign Mesage.

They coined the image of Corruption on the Mahama Administration.

Kwamena Longdon made a song of Woyome Woyome,.

The pro-NPP media lurched on this Corruption allegation and the Supreme Court fine tuned their the NPP Communicators agenda with the phrase ‘Create Loot and Share’.

Then again Bawumia gave a lecture at the Central University and explained that Mahama was not only corrupt but also incompetent.

Arguably these two dreaded words of incompetent and corrupt words were repeated repeatedly that many Ghanaians indeed believed that Mahama was nothing more than an incompetent and corrupt person and still do in spite of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

Fast forward in 2020, the NPP in government committed many humongous scandals and displayed legendary incompetence but however, managed to win yet another election victory.

So question is how does the NPP manage to win the Communicators War to beat the NDC.

The answer may not be far fetched. The answer may simply lie in the fact that whereas the NDC has been winning Daily Debates, NPP has won all Communication Battles over the years.

Imperically the NDC Communications machinery ably managed by Lawyer Sammy Gyamfi, won all the Political Debates on any day , but the NPP won the Communication Wars in the end.

In politics there is a very clear distinction between Communications and Debates.

In political Communication the communicator is advocating an idea on which voters will be convinced to vote for or against.

On the other hand,political Debater, struggles to dispute the view points expressed by his opponents.

The Debater holds Press Conference in the main to dispute what the Communicator has put forward.

The Debater never sets the Communications Agenda, and even if he does, he does not gain media traction.

The NPP looked for jugular slogans however fanciful and use it consistently and repeatedly that Ghanaians have no option to believe of their existence.

The NDC always try unsuccessfully to rebut or mimick the NPP

Listen to the effect of the NDC when the say in passing a couple of times, that the NPP was Super Incompetent- thus admitting that; yes they are incompetent but the NPP is more incompetent but who cares?

Political Communication is by birth a propaganda which simply means say something and even if its a lie say it repeatedly until people come to believe rightly or wrongly that it is, or might be true.

In 2022 the score card was the same, the NPP stuck to the Covid 19 pandemic and Ukraine War as the causes of our economic wows and won the Communication War.

The worse thing that happened to the image of the NDC was their woefully failed attempts to censure the Finance Minister.

Experience should have taught the NDC that a political issue is best left in the political arena and the court of public opinion.

Until the NDC realised that, they win only the Political Debate whereas the NPP wins the Communications War, in 2024 their value may be the same.

Let the NDC find the key to winning the Communication War, and that is by simply branding the NPP for who they are; CRIMINALS and tv DESTOYERS ….or even plain Thieves, repeat and repeat and repeat.

Kofi Atta
Assin Gomoa