Asiedu Nketiah Urges African Parties to Build Capacity to Govern

Political parties in Africa should prepare themselves to run governments rather than treat winning elections as their only goal, according to Johnson Asiedu Nketiah, the newly installed Chairman of the African Political Parties Initiative (APPI).

Mr Asiedu Nketiah, who is also the National Chairman of Ghana's National Democratic Congress (NDC), spoke to the inaugural leadership of APPI in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, as first reported by Citi News. His address came on the closing day of the African Political Parties Summit.

He told the gathering that parties need to build up expertise, policy bodies and institutional memory so that their members are ready for the duties of public office. In his view, a party's capacity to govern well has to be developed well ahead of any election victory.

He argued that parties strongly influence the quality of governance in their countries, because the standards and values they cultivate internally are later carried into the state.

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"What happens inside political parties eventually enters the state," he said.

Mr Asiedu Nketiah noted that political fortunes shift quickly, with today's governing parties possibly becoming tomorrow's opposition, and opposition parties later taking charge of institutions they once criticised. He described parties as places where future governments take shape, and said habits around evidence, competence and respect for institutions are formed long before anyone is sworn in as a minister.

He said any party hoping to lead a country must have a clear grasp of its economy, its institutions and the policy problems it faces.

To that end, he called for stronger policy institutions within parties that can preserve knowledge after individual leaders leave office. He also urged more investment in specialist knowledge in areas including industry, agriculture, trade, energy, technology and public finance.

"Electoral victory gives authority. The ability to govern well has to be built before victory comes," he said.

The APPI chairman further appealed to parties to show greater maturity when governments change. He cautioned against losing experienced people and discarding useful institutions and investments each time power passes from one party to another.

According to Mr Asiedu Nketiah, maturity in politics means being able to judge which things should be changed and which should be kept.

"There is no virtue in wasting what works," he said.