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The NPP Member of Parliament for Dome-Kwabenya, Prof. Mike Oquaye has asked detractors of the party to stop the vicious propaganda against the antecedents of the opposition party. He said persistent claims that the forebears of the New Patriotic Party were responsible for the bomb that narrowly missed Ghana�s first President Kwame Nkrumah at Kulungugu were mischievous propagandist, political, chicanery designed to label the NPP as a violent party. Speaking on MultiTV�s novelty political education programme, Minority Caucus, Prof Mike Oquaye said the perpetrators of that heinous crime were found and prosecuted by Dr Nkrumah�s government and they were not opposition members but members of Dr Nkrumah�s own Convention People�s Party (CPP) who were violently opposed to the president�s dictatorial tendencies which saw him annex all the powers of the state and concentrated everything around himself. The NPP, he argued, has never been, at any point in the country�s political history, the purveyor of violence, rather, members of the party have endured despicable violence in their efforts to ensure a free, democratic, country in which the rule of law and respect for human rights are the bedrock of the society. The Second Deputy Speaker of Parliament is depressed by the deliberate distortion of the country�s political history to the extent that the contribution of forebears of the NPP such as Akufo Addo, Dr Kofi Abrefa Busia, J.B. Danquah and a host of others to the independence struggle was undermined and all the credit given to Dr Nkrumah. Quoting copiously from documents, Prof Oquaye said before Dr Nkrumah was invited by the United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC) as the only permanent staff of the party, the party had formed a groundswell movement of the masses that was ready to make the final push for independence. In fact critical decision such as the name of the new independent nation, the national colours, the date of the declaration of independence, the constitution for the state and the national emblem, had all been taken, even before Dr Nkrumah was brought in, he noted. According to him, March 6 was chosen in 1947 as Ghana�s independence day because of the significance of the Bond of 1944 which was signed on that date. Detractors of the NPP have often pointed to what they call clandestine moves by forebears of the NPP to stop the attainment of independence. They claim the forebears told the British in plain language that Ghana was not ready for independence. But Prof Oquaye, who is also a former Head of the Political Science Department of the University of Ghana, said that argument is tenuous and churlish. He said if the members of the UGCC were not ready for independence as was being insinuated, they would not have spent their own money bring Nkrumah from London to serve as the General Secretary of the party. The commitment of the UGCC to freedom, he stated, was unquestioned and the leaders said so without any equivocation. �We have come from all the corners of this country to decide on how we are going to be governed, a new kind of freedom, a Gold Coast liberty. We left our homes in (ancient) Ghana� and came down here to build for ourselves a new home. There is one thing we brought with us from our ancient Ghana 870 years ago. We brought with us our ancient freedom; today the safety of that freedom is threatened, has been continuously threatened for 100 years since the Bond of 1844 and the time has come for a decision. The decision to be independent should be made now,� Prof Oquaye quoted the leader of the UGCC, Dr J.B. Danquah as saying during the launch of the UGCC in 1947. In his view, therefore, the declaration of independence was effectively made in 1947 even before Nkrumah came back to Ghana. If the words of JB Danquah that �The hour of liberation has struck; inheritors of Ghana�s ancient kingdom, my message as you see is not moved by fear - Aggrey blotted fear from our dictionary. Eagle, fly for thou art not chicken,� was not a declaration of independence then nothing could be. �The name Ghana was chosen by JB Danquah. In that famous telegram soon after the 1948 riots, he referred to the (Gold Coast) as Ghana. He (Danquah) sent a telegram to the colonial secretary and made demands as leader of the independence movement; he demanded the recall of the Governor, called for an interim government led by the UGCC; in fact they even had a constitution. The 1992 Constitution of Ghana was based on the 1979 Constitution, which was based on 1969, which was written essentially by late Chief Justice and president Akufo Addo. That constitution had been written in many parts as early as 1947,� he lectured. He said while he had tremendous respect for Nkrumah and his contribution to the eventual independence of Ghana, it will be a travesty for anybody to seek to diminish the contribution of others. The UGCC opposed Nkrumah only when it became clear that he was deviating from the path the party�s leaders envisaged. They envisaged, a free, democratic, society in which citizens� rights would respected, and they will have the power to hold their leaders accountable. But Dr Nkrumah was pushing a constitution that gave him extraordinary powers � something Prof Oquaye said the leaders of the UGCC could not allow to happen. Digressing from this to deal with perceptions that the NPP is an Akan party, Prof. Oquaye said former President Rawlings had cleverly, albeit mischievously, carved a place for himself in the nation�s politics by pitting Ewes against Ashantis and playing up perceived enmity between the two ethnic groups. Buttressing his point that before the emergence of Rawlings there was no major animosity between Ewes and Akans, the Dome Kwabenya MP said when JB Danquah contested the presidential elections, his highest votes came from the Volta Region and not the Ashanti Region. He credited former first lady Nana Konadu Agyeman-Rawlings of doing extremely well, in the northern part of the country through her 31st December Women�s Movement, in making the NDC a force to reckon. Never in the history of the NPP has its leaders sought to gain political capital by pitting one section of the society against another, he said, and urged political leaders to desist from such divisive tendencies. Dr Nyaho Nyaho Tamakloe, who was also on the programme, said the NPP was truly national party which was a victim of vicious propaganda. He said the United Party (UP), an antecedent of the NPP was made up of a constellation of political groups from every part of the country, citing the National Liberation Movement, the Muslim Youth Association, the Northern People�s Party, the Togoland Congress based in the Volta Region. For him, arguments that the NPP is not a national party are either uninformed or deliberate propaganda by its detractors. He said NPP and its antecedents have always fought injustice, abhorred totalitarianism and arbitrariness, opposed human rights abuses, and stood up to dictators and dictatorship. The NPP�s ideology of property owning democracy is born of the party�s recognition of the individual�s tremendous capabilities to achieve her or his dreams if the state does not unduly interfere with their lives, he stated. Adhering to an ideology that says hardworking citizens must be allowed to enjoy the fruits of their labour, in his view, cannot be, and is not, a license to corruption and thievery.