Presidential Candidate of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Nana Akufo-Addo has revealed his reasons for not attending last Wednesday's Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC) and National Commission on Civic Education (NCCE) organised presidential debate.
According to him, the timing of the debate was wrong and was in conflict with his already tight schedule.
Mr Akufo-Addo came under a lot of criticism for not participating in the debate which had incumbent, John Mahama, the PPP's Dr Paa Kwesi Nduom, PNC's Dr Edward Mahama, CPP's Ivor Greenstreet and independent candidate Jacob Osei Yeboah in attendance.
Indeed, President Mahama in his opening remarks at the debate expressed shock at Mr Akufo-Addo's absence.
But in an interview with Citi FM on Friday, the NPP presidential candidate explained that, unlike the 2012 IEA debate where candidates were alerted well ahead of time to include the debate in their schedules, he was given a short notice and thus could not fix it in his calendar.Â
"At the time the debate was going on, I was addressing a huge number of supporters in Nkawkaw which is also equally important to me", he stated.
Another factor for not attending the debate, he stated, Â was the obvious bias the organising instutions which are state institutions have shown towards him and his Party.Â
"Some of these institutions have not been fair to us in the past and I wonder how they are going to be fair this time".