Month: March 2020

Minority Chief Whip, Mohamed Muntaka Mubarak has served notice that he would not allow the Speaker of Ghana’s Parliament, Professor Aaron Michael Oquaye to gag him in the House, as he ignore him when he tries to catch his eye on a quorum issues earlier last week.

According to him things have become so difficult that the Minority Leader Haruna Iddrisu at a point had to threaten to go to court to challenge the passage of Restriction of Person Bill passed by the House as per Article 104 of the 1992 constitution the House did not have the numbers to pass that Bill.

“The Speaker is abusing the House by what he is doing when you draw his attention to the rules he does not obey it, when you do this then you tell people outside the House to be orderly how fair are you. We make laws but we have chosen not to follow the laid down procedure”.

In an interview, the Minority Chief Whip lamented that it is just unfortunate that his colleague the Majority Leader, Osei-Kyei has an issue with him talking into the microphone when the Speaker refuse to recognize him.

“You have been in this for how long, for how long have I been on my fit and the Speaker looked away and refused to call me, when I am a member of the front bench meaning that he want to gag me”.

He again recounted last two weeks Friday when the Speaker asked MPs’ visitors to the House and staffs to wear their facemask and they have not been taught how to wear it properly and argued that the way they are wearing it should there be infection they would even spread it.

“Speaker would not listen and it should not be especially those of us in leadership all because he wanted to listen to things that would be pleasant to him”.

On the issue of the Majority Leader criticizing him for speaking into the microphone when he was being ignored by the Speaker, he noted that he did worse things when he was then Minority Leader.

“I had been struggling for thirty minutes and the Speaker would not recognize me, when I come by substantive motion, he is the same person to admit”.

As to what steps the Minority would be taking, he noted that it looks like there is a script written for the Majority to follow.

He again pointed out that they are supposed to cooperate, but they would declare that they would no longer cooperate with the Majority, they would strictly follow the rules and if the need be to have banter with them we would do just that.

“We are already on the ground, we fear no fall, they should know they have government business to run. I have been a government whip before, you have to carry your colleagues along, and you cannot pretend that your colleagues do not matter. They do things in a provocative way and that is not fair and it would not be the last time we would raise issues of quorum since they do not want to suspend proceedings in the House in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak”.

Mr. Muntaka lamented that even basic things in the House the Majority cannot address, all they are doing is to rush things through, common basic finance in the House they cannot meet.

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com

Minority Chief Whip Mohamed Muntaka Mubarak has expressed worry that Parliament last week did not have the required numbers given by the standing Order and Constitution to take major decisions but the Speaker Professor Aaron Michael Oquaye ignored it and went ahead with proceedings.

He made this revelation in an interview when he walked out on the Speaker on Monday and Ghanamps.com wanted to know his reasons for this action in his office.

According him as a front bench member of the Minority, he stood up for a long time to catch the eye of the Speaker to draw his attention on issues of quorum whiles major decisions were being taking on the floor of the House.

He backed his point by saying that Article 102 and 104 talks about one third of the two hundred and seventy-five members are needed to take Major decisions, more especially on the Restriction of Persons Bill which was passed by only seventy-eight lawmakers on the floor.

“This whole thing started when we raised issues about coronavirus and adviced we should have limited contacts, but the majority kept insisting there are urgent businesses in the House. But they do not have the numbers, should the disease drop in Parliament as lawmakers, we come into contact with a lot of people, those we know and do not know, it would be difficult to trace”.

He further questioned that if the Majority claims there is urgent business on the floor they have one hundred and sixty-nine members without the Minority where are they. “You are running and taking major decision which can imprison and destroy other people’s business?”

As to why he did not go by their own standing Orders and rules by coming with a substantive motion if he felt drawing attention of quorum the Speaker was ignoring him, he noted that it is the Speaker who admits motions and it can be frustrating.

“Democracy is like that you cannot do what pleases you as a Speaker, blame democracy it can be frustrating, but there are checks and balances when you are going wrong someone would definitely draw your attention”.

Again we have been in the Majority before, and pointed out that he was the Majority Chief Whip and the right thing should be done since the country has chosen the path of democracy.

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com

According to the Builsa North lawmaker, he has been following many calls from professionals and organizations including the Ghana Health Service for a lockdown and government must adhere to their calls since they are the professionals on the field.

He further pointed out in an interview with Journalists that considering the number of affected persons with the coronavirus, there are clear indications that the situation of disease is not getting any better but rather going from bad to worse.

And in addition, urged the President to consider pardoning prison inmates who are almost done with their sentences and those with petty or minor offences.

“The current number of inmates across the country is about fourteen thousand which in actual sense is made up of a capacity of eight thousand prisoners”.

Mr. Agalga noted that it would ease the pressure in Ghanaian prisons as it would be a disaster for the country if there should be any incident of coronavirus at any of our prisons.

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/ghanamps.com

The Minister for Works and Housing, Samuel Atta-Akyea has said Government is keen on delivering one million housing units across the country to address the acute shortage of housing in the country.

According to him it is to address shortage of housing in the medium to long term in the sixteen regions, and of the figure, Greater Accra will have four hundred thousand units.

The Ashanti Region would have two hundred and fifty thousand, fifty thousand for the Western, West North, and Eastern Regions, while the Central region would receive twenty thousand housing units.

Again, thirty thousand units would be built in the North East, Savanna, and Northern regions; twenty thousand in Upper East, and Upper West; with Volta, Oti,  Bono East and Ahafo regions receiving ten thousand housing units.

This came to light when the Member of Parliament for South Dayi, Rockson Nelson Dafiamekpoh questioned the sector Minster, Atta Akyea on the housing deficits in the country.

“It is however instructive to note that there is a lot more to be done to increase the housing stock and bridge the national housing deficit as currently the Ministry is focusing its attention on strategies and interventions for the medium-term period (2018-2021) to resolve the challenges of the housing sub-sector of the economy”.

He placed more emphasis on reducing the national deficit through the provision of adequate safe secure quality and affordable housing schemes in collaboration with the private sector.

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com