Month: November 2021

Speaker of Parliament Rt. Hon Alban Kingsford Sumana Bagbin said he is the number two gentleman of Ghana constitutionally, but protocol wise when you start from the President as number one you have to get to the Vice President.

According to him there are three arms of government from the Executive arm of Government, you move to the Legislature and the Judiciary.

“I am not saying this, my colleagues in the Supreme Court actually said the Speaker is number two, all those who were present at that meeting were convinced when a Supreme Court judge made the suggestion and justified it”.

Speaker Bagbin said, he had initially said he is number three, “let us be clear in our minds that the Executive, Legislature and Judiciary are equal arms of government and should be treated as such”.

In addressing a post-budget workshop at Ho in the Volta Region, he pointed out that since 1993 the Legislature and Judiciary have never gotten one percent of the country’s total revenue, and stated that discussing this issue with President Nana Akufo-Addo, he was shocked when he saw the data.

And further added that, he had had the opportunity to discuss this issue with both the Majority and Minority Leaders on how to transit from below one percent to five percent within the three years. “You are shouting and complaining that they come to meet you in your house and they take over your bedroom, Government must provide offices for MPs in their constituencies; this thing has been discussed, parliament should get two percent of the budget, judiciary to get two percent, that is four out of 100 percent, 96 is for the executive and state institutions, “is it too much to ask?”, he queried.

He said the presiding members bemoaned the state of the assemblies in the country, stating that contracts are awarded and they are not consulted, they need to be empowered and parliament needs to give them inspiration.

“Speakers retire with only rent allowance, they are not on pension, it is now that I am talking about it and people are shocked whiles other arms you know how they are retired, clerk of parliament retires on five hundred and fifty pension every month”.

He told the gathering that when former president John Kuffour was retiring, he knew how he served Ghana and some of the difficult decision he had to take and he called on the country to take care of him.

And added that, very soon when the reality gets to Ghanaians, “we would be struggling to get people to come to Parliament; now you are riding four wheels because the condition support it, look at your former colleague MPs, which of them is riding in four wheels”.

He revealed that there are a number of funerals he had to send money to support every weekend because some families have rejected the bodies of former MPs and they had to organise to go and bury them.

“Twenty years in leadership, if I want to enjoy, what wouldn’t I enjoy; when I call on government to look favorably on the two arms of government, I need your support”.

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com

Speaker of Parliament Rt. Hon Alban Kingsford Bagbin is advocating for the Legislative arm of government to be well resourced to enable them to do their work very well.

According to him before the presentation of the budget, he discussed with the finance minister non-release of statutory funds in his lobby together with his deputies such funds like District Assembly Common Fund and GETfund, and National Health Insurance.

He admonished that; “If you want the arm of government to work, enable it do its job, otherwise scrap it and stop wasting everybody’s time; we should not pretend we are practicing democracy because every four years we go for an election”.

He told lawmakers that he was having discussion with the finance minister on how parliament should be well resourced and that delayed the presentation of the budget, and he noticed in the media that he was the one who delayed the presentation of the budget because he was demanding double of what was allocated to parliament.

“This is not the way to go, when we sit in conclave and discuss such matters it comes out, I would not have referred to it but it has influenced some peoples’ perception of me but I am not a member of Parliament”.

Again, many of the things MPs benefit from, he does not benefit from it and he is not entitled to common fund, car loan, rent allowance; “I do not get those things, so when I am working and fighting for Parliament, is not for my benefit, at this age if I have not enjoyed life then what again?”.

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com

The Minority in Ghana’s Parliament has given strong indications even before the 2022 government budget statement and economic policy debate on the floor of the House that, they are unable to support government with the introduction of the E-Levy.

According to the Minority Leader, Haruna Iddrisu they are unable to build a national consensus on the E-Levy as Vice President Dr. Bawumi questioned, “why tax poor people for MoMo as the banks are taxed”.

“We do not have difficulty serving you notice that we would not be convinced on the justification on this particular tax measure; it would be a victim of double taxation. Take for instance hundred and thirty-six (136) television stations that have no billing system, how are you able to take them on board in other to get them on board in other to be electronically taxed?”.

He added that we were moving back to chasing functional economy instead of driving towards a paperless economy that remains the fundamental factor to the country’s key objectives.

Again, re-introduction of Agyapa deal, they have seen what collateralization has done to the road fund; at the same time contractors remain unpaid as some have blood pressure over long standing arrears by government.

 “We have again seen, what collateralization has done to GETFund; today as we speak, out of the one point four billion that was received from GETFund, I am sure government is indebted to GETfund, not less than five hundred billion Ghana cedis, Nation Health Insurance is surviving on bonds”, he noted.

 Mr. Iddrisu said the future of the country should not be endangered by re- introduction of Agyapa as we are still suffering. There is still unemployment in the country and what the finance minister has done is to share with us their micro-economic indicators, inflation, and interest rate that are doing well.

But no report on how unemployment is being addressed and as a country we should be interested in that.

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com

Speaker of the Eight (8) Parliament Rt. Hon Alban Kingsford Sumana Bagbin said the current Parliament is in the right position not to allow itself to be bullied into playing second fiddle to the Executive arm of government.

According to him Parliament can remove the president, but the president cannot remove the Speaker, and was confident that the House would ensure parliament is adequately resourced to be able to execute its mandate.

“I am happy with the cooperation of both the Majority and Minority Leaders at the Parliamentary Bord Serves level, that was where we proposed that two percent of the total revenue to be allocated to Parliament next year”.

At a post budget workshop for Members of Parliament (MPs) on Saturday, November 20, 2021, he noted that the Finance Minister Ken Ofori Atta disagree with the two percent proposal, but want his budget approved.

“This is simply a reminder to him of what his father did, it is not a threat, but just a reminder, we have been fighting for ourselves but the judiciary cannot do same, we have to fight for them.”

Again, he pointed out that the Parliament represent the people, hence the reason when he moves outside Ghana, he extends the president’s warm regards to the participants and the President represent that state.

“We have been cloth with enough powers to approve or not to approve budget statement depending of its relevance and value, you should get control over your finances”, he asserted.

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com

Parliament of Ghana would on Tuesday, November 23, 2021 start debate on the 2022 Budget Statement and Economic Policy of the government, Majority Leader Osei-Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu told the House on Friday, November 19, 2021.

Mr. Osei-Kyei-Bonsu made this known on the floor of the House when he presented the Business Statement for the following week.

On Tuesday, November 23, 2021 the debate would touch on Finance, Environment, Gender, Foreign Affairs, Youth and Sports and Employment.

The following day, Wednesday, November 24, 2021 would be Health, Trade and Industry, Communication, Local Government, Lands and Forestry, Works and Housing, Energy and Mining.

On Thursday, November 25, 2021 the debate would touch on Education, Agriculture, Roads and Transport, Defence and Interior, Judiciary, Parliament, Independent Governance Institutions and Government machinery.

The debate would be concluded on Friday, November 26, 2021 where leadership of the House conclude the debate.

Each day, two lawmakers from each side of the political divide would be expected to contribute to the debate, where seconder and Ranking member of the Finance Committee would be allotted twenty minutes.

Other committee chairpersons and Ranking members fifteen minutes and all other members ten minutes.

Sitting for next week would commence at 10:00am with extended sitting. The Leader of government business explained that the House would suspend sitting at 2:00pm and resume by 3:00pm and close around 6:00pm.

Meanwhile, for next week, forty-eight (48) questions are supposed to be asked, including eleven (11) urgent questions and thirty-seven (37) oral questions.

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com

Speaker of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Parliament, Dr. Sidie Mohammed Tunis on Friday, November 19, 2021 held a meeting with the Nigerien President, H. E. Mohammed Bazoum.

The meeting was aimed at soliciting support for the direct election of lawmakers into the ECOWAS Parliament.

During the meeting, which took place at the Presidential Palace, further discussions on the state of the ECO and its importance to regional integration were held.

The Speaker was accompanied by the first deputy speaker of the Community Parliament Ahmed Idris Wase, Mohammed Ibn Chambas and former President Mahamadou Issoufou.

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com

The Planting for Export and Rural Development (PERD) programme would shore up revenue from three crop sector by over 14 billion dollars, with each tree crop estimated to raise at least 2 billion dollars like cocoa.

Government is fully committed to making this a reality and has demonstrated in no uncertain terms, its determination, with the establishment of the Tree Crop Authority as the regulatory body for ensuring maximum returns on the huge investments by government and the private sector, Dr Akoto Afriyie told Parliament.

Responding to the Member of Parliament for Asene/Akroso/Manso, George Kwame Aboagye’s question on the achievements or progress made since the implementation of the planting for Export and Rural Development programme, he said “Mr. Speaker, the Planting for Export and Rural Development (PERD) Programme, is a market oriented rural based agricultural value chain intervention, driven mainly by the private sector. Th programme is designed to diversify the Ghanaian export portfolio and accelerate rural development. Seven crops are being promoted under the programme. These are coffee, coconut, rubber, oil palm, cashew, mango and shea.”

Following the launch of the PERD programme in April 2019, after feasibility studies were undertaken in 2018, approximately 294 million certified planting materials (coffee, coconut, rubber, oil palm, cashew, mango and shea) have been supplied to 220,257 smallholder farmers and 35 commercial farmers under the PERD Diversified Integrated Project. The beneficiaries of the seedlings are located in 115 districts across the 16 regions.

He further said, with the introduction of the PERD programme, a new chapter has been opened to unlock the huge potential of the Ghana Tree Crop sector. Our goal is to develop each of the crops to the level of cocoa, Ghana’s leading export crop, which rakes in over 2 billion dollars revenue annually.

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com

Minister for Food and Agriculture, Dr. Akoto Afriyie has assured Parliament that tractors and accessories at the Agriculture Engineering Service Directorate are being cared for and have not been left at the mercy of the weather.

This came to light when Member of Parliament for Ejura-Sekyedumase, Muhammad Bawah Braimah wanted to know why hundreds of Cabrio tractors and motorbikes imported over two years have been left at the mercy of the weather.

Dr. Afriyie reiterated to the House that, as part of efforts by the Ministry of Food and Agriculture to improve access to mechanized services through the mechanization module of the Planting for Food and Jobs (PFJ) programme, a range of tractors and handheld equipment were imported from Czech Republic under a 10 million Euro from Exim Bank facility in 2019/2020.

“The equipment are on sale to interested farmers at a government subsidized rate of 40% with a specified terms of sale of outright payment. In total 220 Cabrio compact tractors were imported by the Ministry.

So far, only 10 of the 220 tractors had been purchased by interested farmers leaving a total of 210 Cabrio tractors.

The slow patronage of the tractors thus far is due to the policy of outright payment governing the sale of the facilities. The strict enforcement of the policy by the Ministry is because of a high rate of default in the payments of tractors by beneficiaries under a hire purchase policy in the past.

The Ministry has now identified rice farmer groups in the valleys of several forest regions and we are arranging to distribute the Cabrio tractors to them on credit instead of to individual farmers, he stated.

On the question of motorbikes, the Ministry currently has only seven (7) motorbikes in stock out of a total of three thousand (3,000) procured.

“Mr. Speaker, the motorbikes were procured under the Modernizing Agriculture in Ghana (MAG) sponsored by Canadian Government.

 The procurement constitutes part of Government strategy to enhance Extension Service delivery to farmers and other shareholders in the regions, Out of the Three Thousand (3,000) motorbikes, Two Thousand, Nine Hundred and Ninety-Three (2,993) have been deployed to the regions. The distribution was done from June 2019 to August 2021 leaving seven (7).

The remaining 7 motorbikes will be distributed to the National directorates to facilitate work. It is expected that the distribution will be completed by the end of the year.”

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com