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Contrary to media reports and suggestions vice President Paa Kwesi Bekoe Amissah Arthur is likely to be retained as running mate of President John Dramani Mahama for the 2016 elections, because he picked the President’s nomination forms, The aL-hAJJ’s usual reliable information indicates that may not be entirely true.

Deep throat sources at the Flag Staff House and Cantonments residence of the first family disclosed to this paper that, the former Governor of the Bank of Ghana, now vice President, is not an automatic choice running mate for President Mahama.

Short of mentioning who then partners the President into the 2016 elections, our source only retorted to reports in the media of President Mahama retaining Amissah-Arthur, “I have also heard and read about it in the media, but I can assure you that His Excellency Amissah-Arthur is not the automatic choice for 2016 running mate.”

Acknowledging the vice President’s valuable contributions to the “impressive” performance of the John Mahama administration so far, the source added that “for now it will not be out of place to suggest that President Mahama will retain vice President Mahama, but a lot of thinking will go into who partners His Excellency.”

“The NDC as a party has procedures when it comes to the selection of running mate and His Excellency will follow that procedure to the latter. Before then, we are all entitled to speculate about who partners President Mahama for the 2016 elections, but as I said, at the appropriate time, he will make his choice of running mate public after rigorously going through all the procedures outlined in our constitution,” the source added.

Discussions on who partners President John Mahama for the 2016 elections has in recent times attracted news headlines following the President’ submission of his forms to seek the mandate of his party to contest the next presidential elections.

Speculations of Amissah Arthur partnering President Mahama again were earlier heightened when the vice President was instructed by the President to pick his (Mahama’s) nomination forms on his behalf for the November 7 presidential and parliamentary primaries of the governing National Democratic.

Following this development, rumors and speculations was rife in the media that President John Mahama is most likely to retain Paa Kwesi Amissah-Arthur as his running mate for the 2016 polls.

But, The aL-hAJJ sources close to the President indicated that while vice President Amissah-Arthur was and would be a perfect “partner” for the President in the 2016 elections, “he is not the automatic choice as running mate.” Stay tuned