The Member of Parliament for Ofoase Ayirebi, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah has disclosed that he pleaded with his side in Parliament to vote for him to be approved as the Information Minister.

The Minister said putting what happened with the election of the Speaker into consideration, he did not want to leave anything to chance, so when the opportunity to address his colleagues availed itself, he utilised it.

“I did campaign. In the morning of the approval, we held a caucus meeting where we had an opportunity to speak to our colleagues because you would recall that in the first vote, we lost that election for the speaker and in politics, to me, there is nothing like small election.

You don’t go around thinking that it is procedural and that ministers even when they are brought to the floor, they are approved. So I had the opportunity to speak to my colleagues and I asked them to be kind to me and to vote for me. I had to campaign in my party’s caucus so that I will get all the 138 votes to cross the line,” he stated.

He meanwhile rebutted assertions that he persuaded members of the Minority to vote for him, saying, his primary focus was sweeping all 138 votes from his side of the house.

"I didn’t persuade the minority to vote for him because these things when they come up, you can’t tell the conspiracies that are going on in the system and my first interest was to get my 138 votes from my side”, he said.

“There were people on the NDC side who were of the view that I should be approved. So it was a good reckoning in the end when it turned out that I got about 18 extra, he added.

Kojo Opong Nkrumah was one of three Ministers who were not approved at the Committee level and had to be approved to their designated Ministerial positions through voting.

The others are the Minister for Fisheries and Aquaculture Development,  Mavis Hawa Koomson and the Agriculture Minister, Dr Owusu Afriyie Akoto.