Month: October 2021

Member of Parliament for Efutu, Alexander Kwamena Afenyo Markin said he has not taken; neither does he have intentions of taking Gomoa Pomadze lands.

According to him the claims made by the Omanhene of Gomoa Ajumako Traditional Area, Nana Nyarfo Krampah in a press conference on Monday, October 4, 2021 is unfounded.

The Deputy Majority Leader in a press conference on Tuesday, October 5, 2021 pointed out that the chief of Gomoa Ajumako Traditional Area got in all wrong because he, the MP for Efutu has not claimed any land.

And further explained that, the edifice or statue at the Winneba junction roundabout is not himself as Afenyo Markin but it is a statue of Ghana’s first President, the late Osagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah shaking hands with the late J.B Dankwa.

The MP pointed out that he did not organise the press conference to argue with the Omanhene of Gomoa Ajumako but just to set the record straight, and he putting up a police station at new Winneba is not a new development that has occurred in the area.

The Chief of Pomadze who is the real custodian of the land in question, Nana Kofi Apata -V who was at the press conference with Afenyo Markin denied any knowledge of the press conference held in his name on Monday, October 5, 2021 by Nana Nyarfo Krampah.

And that whatever development has happened at Winneba Junction roundabout, Pomadze has a collective decision by the Chiefs, MP, police Commander and the elders of the traditional area.

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Dr. Zanetor Agyeman-Rawlings, the Member of Parliament for Klottey-Korle said Ghana’s Parliament cannot be blamed for not having enough women in the House, instead the blame should be put squarely at the door steps of the political parties.

According to her women are not given enough chance to move at various levels with the party structures.

“If you look at election 2020, the primaries that preceded it, you have female MPs who were contested by their male counterparts and some of them lost”.

She told Ghnamps.com that the political parties need to realign their structures to encourage more women into parliament in ensuring that, “we are actually fulfilling the quota. We are facing challenges and it is not enough to constantly look at parliament and say it is difficult, it has never been easy being a woman in any leadership position”.

More so, there is not opportunity for women to rise to hold other enviable positions in the parties like to become chairpersons, among others. You enter any meeting and majority of the chairpersons are men. “It is almost as if the system is rigged towards men and pushed against women, and you do not find a lot of women going for positions because it is not women friendly. It is like you are either a woman’s organizer or deputy, very rarely do you have women youth organisers, meanwhile youth is not made up of only men, it is about young people men and women”, she opined.

According to her, when the issues is raised about encouraging more women to take positions, the response you get is, “if you cannot handle it, you should not be within it”, but that is not good enough in a country where we have more women than men, stating that when you look at countries where we have more women in government in various position within the political parties you actually find that there is a lot of positive transformation in the society”.

Dr. Zanetor said it is about time we take practical steps to actualize the call for pushing women in leadership positions and stop the lip services. She cited an interesting position of the 1992 constitution of the Republic of Ghana which says “the president shall appoint  and at least one woman”, so the ‘at least’ has become a celling, where the “at least” is meant to say the minimum number should be one woman which means more”.

Instead it has now “become a curse, and it reflects in Parliament one way or the other you have leadership in parliament ‘at least’ one woman.

“We need to have honest convention on this, we are not doing what we say we want to do, we talk about it but when it comes to the actual work of implementing, what we say we are actually not fulfilling that”.

She further gave the example of the immediate past speaker of Ghana’s Parliament, Professor Oquaye who invited her counterpart from Uganda, and she had very strong words for Ghana on the women in leadership position in Ghana.

“It was a real slap on the hand, we hear a lot of these and go back to our usual ways of doing things; change is not comfortable, and if we can actually come to terms with the fact that having more women in leadership is not undermining the men, but rather complementing and supporting so you have men and women working together to bring different perspectives of offering solutions to problems”.

As to when we should start the honest and serious talk of getting more women to take up position in Ghana’s governances, she said: “yesterday, it is long overdue, we need to go beyond that serious conversation to actually incentivizing every aspect of our society and push the agenda of getting more women in whatever representation it is not enough to talk about it”.

Funding Gap

Dr. Zanetor further pointed out that there is also a funding gap for women trying to venture into politics as they are not likely to get the financial support from people. Women in general, she said do not get enough funding to support their campaigns and because of that they are less likely to win in a lot of their elections. “And base on that if you are someone who takes risk and decides to run in an election, for someone to decide who to invest money in, it is about who is likely to win; and a lot of times you find out that it is not in favour of women”.

“If you look at the statistics, it is quite clear how many women have attempted, and how many of them go through”.

Violence against Women

There is also violence against women in politics during elections which is very real. The abuse of women and denigration of women just simply because they are women are all reason a lot of qualified women would still not want to put themselves up to take up challenges or leadership roles in politics.

Speaking on the challenges in working in a male dominated House, she noted that there are certain issues that are really difficult to address, with, “no disrespect intended, but women have better understanding with regard to how issues affect us and children and the society at large”.

Again, she pointed out that there are “different orientation in the upbringing of women, in respect of culture, certain issues would not generally cross the minds of men, and as part of the orientation of men in the Ghanaian society, it is not one thing they are trained to think about simple because it is not one of their duties, “so that blind spot that happens just by the virtue of not being that you are not a woman is not a blame game, but just the reality of where we find ourselves”, she stated.

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Leader of the Ghanaian delegation to the fifth Community Parliament, Alexander Kwamena Afenyo-Markin said the parliament does not expect any delegation from Guinea Conakry to the upcoming, Extraordinary Session in Winneba which starts on Tuesday, October 12, 2021 and expected to last for ten days.

The military takeover in Guinea Conakry witnessed the National Assembly being dissolved by the military junta led by Colonel Mamady Doumbouya. The Authority of Heads of States and Government subsequently suspended Guinea from all ECOWAS governing bodies until the restoration of constitutional order.

According to him one hundred and three (1o3) lawmakers to the Community Parliament are expected, the Rt. Hon. Speaker Sidie Mohammed Tunis and his four deputies as well as experts invited who are expected to take them through various aspects of the programme.

The military junta in Mali after their coup appointed a delegation to represent the country at the Parliament’s First Extraordinary Session in Sierra Leon 2021, but they were not allowed to represent the country as the Authority of Heads of States and Government had suspended the country from participating in the activities of its institutions.

The Extraordinary Session is on the theme: “High level evaluating seminar on two decades of democratic elections in the ECOWAS region: achievement challenges and the way forward”.

Mr. Afenyo-Markin recounted that currently there has been instability within the West African sub-region despite the fact that “we started well embracing democratic dispensation; unfortunately we have had coups and the issue of sub-regional leaders seeking third term”.

The Session would review everything that has been done as a sub-region for the past twenty years and perhaps come out with a new road map aim at ensuring that there is peace and political stability, and also put across the views of the Parliament on the situation in the sub-region to the Authority of Heads of States and Governments through a communiqué.

“We have made sufficient arrangement for accommodations; hotels that need to upgrade their facilities have done that and the protocol team of the parliament has been to Winneba and are satisfied with the facilities so far; the University of Education Winneba auditorium, which has the

state-of-the-art facilities would be the venue for the main event”. Windy Lodge Conference room would also be on the standby for other consultative meetings and seminars.

And in terms of security the Inspector General of Police (IGP) has made preparation for men and women of the police force to be in Winneba to support the programme, adequate streetlights had been provided with the Minister of Roads and Highways being magnanimous to put arrangements to provide good road networks.

It is the “first in history of ECOWAS that a Session would be held outside the national capital city, and again first time that a delocalised meeting was held outside the National capital, and the Ghanaian delegation would be on the stand by to make this Session a memorable one” the leader of the Ghanaian delegation stated.

The Effutu lawmaker pointed out at a media briefing ahead of the Session that some city beautification projects would be unveiled, and handed over to the Ministry of Tourism and the Ghana Tourism Authority to manage and administer Osimpa heritage center, a museum where the history of Winneba and the Effutu people would be told.

And other tourism attraction points would be the unity square where an edifice called reconciliation roundabout would also be unveiled – the statues of two past Ghanaian national figures who played divers roles for the development of Ghana, “Dr. Kwame Nkrumah and J. B. Danquah, when you go to Akosua village the fisherman square would also be unveiled”, he added.

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Ahead of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Parliament’s Extraordinary Session scheduled for Tuesday, October 12, 2021 to Friday, October 22, 2021, the people of Winneba over the weekend undertook a health walk to create awareness of the hosting of the Session, outside the national capital.

Leader of the Ghanaian delegation to the sub-regional parliament, Alexander Kwamena Afenyo- Markin joined constituents on a float through major principal streets of Winneba to create awareness of the upcoming Session.

At a press conference addressed by the Member of Parliament for Effutu, he assured Ghanaians that Winneba is ready for the Extraordinary Session and sufficient preparations have been made, and in terms of infrastructure and logistics government of Ghana has provided the needed support to host the event, likewise cooperate institutions in Ghana have given their firm support.

Benefit to the Economy of Winneba

As to the expected benefit of the meeting to the Winneba economy, he pointed out that, the hotels were the first to benefit post COVID-19 as it brought some light to their businesses, explaining that because COVID-19 limited movement of people, it hit hard on the hotel industry, but the delocalised meeting was the first support for those in the hotel and restaurants business. There were also rippling effects on the poultry farmers as they had to sell birds to them; and with the Extraordinary Session these businesses will even benefit more, as already ten hotels have been fully booked.

In addition, those in the transport sector – taxi drivers are going to benefit as delegates would joint taxi wanting to see town, and the “spending power would create more liquid for the economy of Effutu, the market woman, the pepper and tomatoes marketer are going to benefit at that micro level.”

At the macro level is an opportunity to sell the Ghanaian brand through a new vehicle, and marking the Ghanaian brand through Accra has always been the thing, but this time around it is through Winneba. The benefit to Winneba is that it is now on the international map and on the spotlight, and people would want to come and see what is in the area.

“We have a beautiful costal city but we have not explored its potential that much, where people would say I never knew I could enjoy the nice beach in Winneba come in invest there”, he said when questioned by journalists.

He further added that this was an opportunity for the people of Effutu constituency in Winneba to reconcile since they have had their own issues of chieftaincy issues here and there, “there is unity of purpose since the people know we are getting international guests”, the MP stated.

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The Minority in Parliament is demanding the inclusion of other national identity cards as pre-requisites in the ongoing SIM card registration.

 Government under the supervision of the Ministry of Communication and Digitalisation has ordered a re-registration of all SIM cards as part of moves to dealing with digital fraud. As a requirement, one is demanded to present a Ghana card as a pre-requisite for registration.

Speaking at a press conference held by the minority caucus on the communication committee, the MP for Ningo Prampram who is the ranking member on the committee, Samuel Narttey George kicked against the move to limit the registration to only the Ghana card.

According to the deputy minority spokesperson on the committee, the Legislative Instrument 211 clause 1, does not limit such exercises only to the Ghana card but other national ID cards.

The Minority described the move to disconnect all persons who fail to register their SIM cards by March next year, with the Ghana card as an affront to the rights of the citizen.

They proposed for four more IDs to be added to make the process a robust one including the withdrawal of threat to disconnect all SIM cards that would fail to register by next year and scrapping off the physical visit to offices of the NIA office for registration purposes.

“The Minority supports the SIM registration exercise which would curb fraud, but we should not use only Ghana card, all we are asking is that passport, driver’s licenses and voters ID should be added to the national identification cards, the Supreme Court has ruled that the voters ID shows you are a Ghanaian”.

Again, he pointed out that the point the Minority is making is to ensure that an exercise is carried out that can stand the test of time and they have met with the sector minister to point out their grievances and hope they would listen to them.

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The Deputy Ranking member on Defense and Interior, Dr. Zanetor Agyeman-Rawlings has underscored the importance of working on the psych of Ghanaians, to appreciate the need to beef -up the country’s military equipment, and installations to better place them to defend our territorial boundaries against any form of threat.

According to her it is alien to Ghanaians when it comes to consideration of huge budgets towards the nation’s defense or its internal security.

“Anytime there is an issue with regard to the procurement of equipment towards defense, there is always public outcry because we take our peace in this country for granted”.

Speaking with Ghanamps.com, she pointed out that, despite the fact that there is terrorist attack around the country’s neighbours, it should never be taken for granted that, “it has never happened and it is not going to happen, that is not a luxury that we can afford to have anymore given the reality of what is happening; we have so many attacks that had happened very close to our borders and surrounding countries”.

The Klottey-Korle lawmaker gave an example of attacks in Burkina Faso which has more or less, been run by violent extremists, “which means the advancement is happening”. And confirmed that the issues of these security threats have come to the attention of the Committee for discussion.

Again, she pointed out that the country can not get away from the reality of what it is faced with, and appealed for the need to educate Ghanaians on the necessity to acquire military equipment for both protection of the country’s land borders and airbase.

She also reminded the security agencies to look within the country and neutralize conditions that would allow our citizens to be radicalized. “As a nation, we should move beyond the protection of our borders to ensure that, we are not creating a suitable environment internally that would encourage sleeper cells that would encourage the radicalization of our youth by some of these violent extremists. It goes beyond military hardware”, she stated.

More so, it is important with regard to intelligence sharing in the ECOWAS sub-region, hence the bill that was laid in Ghana’s Parliament before the House rose was an important aspect of this.

Commenting further, she explained that corruption cannot be ignored, because it plays a role in creating a vacuum that allows people to take up the vacuums created to perpetuate crimes.

She said extremist always take advantage of the needs of the people to spread their agenda. She said they come as philanthropist to solving challenges of communities and end up recruiting them to violent crimes.

Dr. Zanetor also described the practice in which people’s affiliation to political parties determine their chances of employment as dangerous. “Whether you are a member of a party, whether you have evidence of a party card is a prerequisite to which you get a job. What that means is that you have a lot of young people who are disillusioned, they were told when they were children, when they went to university and did a tertiary course it guaranteed an employment, and a means of getting money into their pocket”.

“Now by virtue of they being at the wrong side of one political party or one ethnic group, they are disadvantage and cannot get job, which means someone else offering them money to engage them in act of terrorism for violence becomes an employer to them, and a lot of these people have access to natural resources”, she said.

“We do not recognise the link between galamsey and violence, extremist and terrorisms are so direct, we are literally opening ourselves up; recently when there was clampdown on mining activities in Burkina Faso, we have influx of people into the Northern Ghana, the struggle for natural resources is real”.

The Klottey Korle, law maker pointed out further in an interview that if there is a situation within a country, where vacuum is created, it creates a gap between what the state is supposed to provide and what the people have access to, “that gap is what a lot of these groups capitalized on”.

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com