<<Print>>

Several political parties have threatened to boycott this year’s IEA presidential debate citing the 'preferential treatment' the institution intends to give the two major political parties as a reason they would refuse to be part of the event.  

Despite the 'preferential treatment' in place for the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and the New Patriotic Party (NPP), deputy General Secretary of the NDC has thrown shades at the IEA claiming they lacked respect for the late former President Atta Mills.

Mr. Koku Anyidoho, a former presidential spokesperson to the late president told Kwame Nkrumah Tikese on Okay FM that the institution had wanted to   capitalize on rumours of Mills’ poor eyesight by staging the 2008 presidential debate at an unfavorable venue.

“Do you know where IEA held the Presidential Debate in 2008? They chose to organize the debate at a basement at the Alisa Hotel in Accra. Apart from that 2008 debate, the IEA has not held any of the Presidential debate there again.

“The stairs to the platform was so steep, if you recall at that time there were rumours that President Mills was blind in one eye, and the programme was held around 8:00pm”.

Mr. Anyidoho continued that “I was always with President Mills at that time, descending down that stairs was not easy at all, and that was deliberate on the part of the IEA, so that he’ll tumble and fall, of course you’ll tell me that he was not the only one who attended that event, but a trap was set for him, but God being on his side he escaped. Some of the issues that we have with the IEA are so deep when we start talking someone will say we’re bitter, it’s not bitterness...facts are facts”.