Former Director of Elections of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Martin Adjei-Mensah Korsah, has urged the party to elect parliamentary candidates for constituencies where it currently has no sitting Member of Parliament (MP) within the next two to three months.
According to the Techiman South MP, the early selection of parliamentary candidates in the party’s “orphan constituencies” is necessary to strengthen the NPP’s preparations for the next general elections.
He said the party needed to put local leadership structures in place early enough to help improve its electoral fortunes in constituencies where it does not currently hold parliamentary seats.
“I would have wished that in every constituency where we don’t have MPs, in the next 2-3 months, we ought to be having them. We need local leadership to further the party’s fortunes,” he said.
His comments follow the Supreme Court’s July 29, 2026, ruling declaring the delegate-based system used by political parties to elect presidential and parliamentary candidates unconstitutional.
Mr. Korsah, however, believes the NPP is in a relatively advantageous position because it has already elected its flag bearer, unlike other political parties that are yet to complete either their presidential or parliamentary candidate selection processes.
“In one breath, you may say that the NPP is completely absolved, but not really. We are the first and only political party to have elected its presidential candidate. There are others who are much later than us… So we are one leg out. But we still have one year within which to do that,” he maintained.
According to him, the NPP has traditionally prioritized parliamentary candidate elections in constituencies where it does not have sitting MPs before proceeding to constituencies where it has incumbent MPs.
“By practice we always do the orphan constituencies first before the sitting MPs,” he said.
He added that the party has also, in previous election cycles, extended the election of parliamentary candidates in constituencies with sitting MPs until the election year.
Mr. Korsah, therefore, suggested that the NPP could use the one-year window provided following the Supreme Court’s decision to reorganize and complete its internal electoral processes.
“So it may be part of the arrangement that the party will do to make sure that we take advantage of the one-year window and reorganize ourselves,” he said.
He cautioned, however, that the party could be affected if it fails to complete the necessary processes within the stipulated timeframe.
“If by design we are unable to work within the one-year time frame, then of course we are affected,” he said.
