Ghana News Online

Following his defeat during the New Patriotic Party’s Presidential Primaries, one of the major contenders, Kennedy Ohene Agyapong, has said he will no longer allow himself to be taken for granted.

The former Member of Parliament for Assin Central, while speaking in an interview with ace broadcaster and celebrated satirist, Kwaku Sintim-Misa (KSM), Mr. Agyapong said the experience has fundamentally changed his outlook on politics and his relationships with people within the NPP.

“I will not allow myself to be used by anybody again. I need respect. This year I will be 64 years. So I will not allow anybody to treat me like trash. That one, I’m sorry. So let them do their own thing,” he said.

There have been several calls for him to contest as an independent candidate in the upcoming 2028 elections, but Mr. Agyapong declined the call, cementing his dogged solidarity and loyalty to the NPP and its traditions.

According to Mr. Agyapong, he had psyched his mind going into the fierce contest that it is a 50-50 venture; it is either he wins or he loses, so having gotten the latter only highlights his position.

“Some are saying go independent-No! I’m not going independent because going into that contest, I knew, and I psyched myself that it was 50-50. You can win, you can lose; so if you lose, why would you say that I’m going independent? No! I will not do that to my party,” Ohene Agyapong said.

Mr. Agyapong, in his interview, admitted that the outcome of the primary had left him deeply disappointed, particularly with the conduct of some party members he purportedly had supported in their political careers.

According to him, while he accepts that party members are free to support any candidate of their choice, he was troubled by what he described as disparaging remarks made against him by individuals he had helped to rise within the party.

“I am not bitter because Vice President won”, he said, adding that he was bitter because some of the very people he supported to become Members of Parliament and ministers went beyond not voting for me to making derogatory statements about him.

Mr Agyapong clarified that he did not expect automatic loyalty or private assurances of votes, noting that political support was a matter of choice.

However, he maintained that personal attacks from beneficiaries of his support were difficult to forgive.

“If you did not vote for me, that is your choice. I have no problem with that. But the insults from people I helped — that is where my problem is,” he emphasised.

He also rejected suggestions that he should simply move on as though nothing had happened, insisting that honesty was more important than political convenience.