Adwoa Safo didn’t betray NPP in Speaker Election – Bagbin

Speaker of Parliament, Alban Sumana Kingsford Bagbin, has dismissed long-standing claims that former Dome-Kwabenya MP, Sarah Adwoa Safo, voted for him during the hotly contested 2021 Speaker of Parliament election.

He said the allegations were entirely false and stemmed from a misunderstanding of his close personal relationship with the former lawmaker.

Mr. Bagbin, who was elected Speaker in January 2021 after a tense and chaotic parliamentary vote, said he felt compelled to set the record straight following years of public speculation. The election had been marked by confusion and chaos, with one New Patriotic Party (NPP) MP believed to have broken ranks to support his bid—an act many attributed to Adwoa Safo.

Speaking when the family of Apostle Kwadwo Safo paid a courtesy call on him on Monday, October 13, 2025, the Speaker publicly cleared Adwoa Safo of any wrongdoing. “I call her my daughter because when I came to Parliament, she was a small girl. So, I began calling her my daughter before she joined politics and entered Parliament. But we belong to different political traditions,” he explained.

He added that their long-standing bond had been wrongly interpreted by some people as political loyalty. “Because she is my daughter and we love each other, when I was contesting to be Speaker, they thought she voted for me,” he said.

Bagbin’s clarification comes after years of speculation and partisan debate following his election victory by 138 votes to 136 over Prof. Aaron Mike Oquaye, despite the NPP’s slim majority in Parliament at the time.

Adwoa Safo herself has consistently denied voting against her party’s candidate, describing previous claims by former Majority Leader Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu as false.