Reports reaching The Chronicle in Takoradi indicate that immediately the Electoral Commission declared Mr. Emmanuel Armah Kofi-Buah as winner of the Elembelle constituency elections, supporters of the NDC took over the principal streets of Essiama, Aiyinase and Asasetre, which are all towns and villages in the area to jubilate. They were clad in red and black clothes to signify the end of the regime of Ellembele “Mugabe”.
Their celebrations, however, nearly created some confusion in the constituency and the security had to intervene to prevent clashes with supporters of the MP, who were disheartened over the outcome of the elections.
When the MP elect, Emmanuel Armah Kofi Buah was contacted by The Chronicle after his victory, he said the analysis done by The Chronicle in its last edition on Ellembele before the election, was the exact outcome. He also indicated that if it was in the United States of America, The Chronicle would have been commended, because the paper got it right for presenting facts that turned out to be the reality on the ground.
The figures indicated that Buah got over 14,000 votes and the incumbent MP got relatively over 12,000 votes, while the independent candidates who, Chronicle had predicted were going to cause the defeat of the MP had close to 3000 votes. This situation propelled the NDC candidate to victory since all the independent candidates in the race were coming from the camp of either the CPP or the NPP. It looked like if the independent votes had been added to Hon. Blay, he would have been elected once again, but that was not to be.
In the Evalue-Gwira constituency, Hon. Kojo Armah defied the odds to contest the seat he won with the support of the NPP in 2004. He could only garner a little over 2000 votes as against the over 6,000 and 11,000 votes bagged by the NDC and NPP candidates respectively.
In the Amenfi West and Central, the NDC maintained its dominance and closed the gap in the East, where the former Western Regional Minister, Joseph Boahen was contesting. In the Southern sector of the region, the NDC closed the big gap that existed previously between it and the NPP and made some gains in the presidential.
The NDC has, therefore, moved from its present 8 seats in the region to 12 seats, losing only Jomoro, currently being occupied by Hon. Lee Ocran to Samia Nkrumah, the only CPP candidate who performed creditably in the election. She polled over 20,000 votes against a little over 6000 polled by Hon. Lee Ocran. To this end, the NDC has increased its seats from 8 to 12, while the NPP fell from 12 seats to 9.
The NDC again maintained its traditional dominance in the Northern part of the region and caused painful defeats to some of the NPP candidates in constituencies such as Prestea Huni-Valley, being occupied by Albert Obbin, Shama by Angelina Baiden Amissah, and Aowin by Hon. Samuel Adu-Gyemfi.
All indicators point to the facts that all the constituencies in the region where the candidates were imposed by the leadership of the NPP lost, not only in parliamentary, but reduced marginally the presidential gap between the two leading political figures. In traditional constituencies of the NPP, the NDC presidential candidate, John Evans Atta Mills had more votes than what he got in all the previous elections in the region.
