Month: February 2022

The Committee on Constitutional, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs has held its third public hearing on the Promotion of Proper Human Sexual Rights and Ghanaian Family Values Bill, 2021.

The purpose of the public hearing was to give individuals and organizations who have submitted memoranda on the Bill the opportunity to justify their submissions and offer further explanation on their views on the matter..

Representatives from Key Watch Ghana, Assemblies of God, Interfaith Diversity Network for West Africa and Alliance for Equality and Diversity made various presentations on the Bill during the sitting.

The Acting Chairman and MP for Sunyani East Hon. Ameyaw Cheremeh and the Ranking Member, Bernard Ahiafor, who is also the MP for Akatsi South led the discussions.

They both thanked the presenters and admitted that it has been a learning process for all the Members of the Committee and indicated that views of the various groups would be considered when the Bill is been taken at the Clause by Clause stage.

The object of the Bill is to provide for proper human sexual rights and Ghanaian Family Values proscribe LGBTQ+ and related activities.

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 The Speaker of Parliament, Rt. Hon. Alban Bagbin, has said that as Leader of the House, he can only be impartial but he cannot be neutral.

Speaking in reference to current issues before Parliament concerning the 2022 Budget and Financial Statement, the Speaker said “the concept of majority rule should give way to participatory inclusiveness. Given the current changes, Parliament cannot continue to apply the old rules, procedures, culture and conduct whilst going through the transitional period; else the march towards democracy will be halted”.

He was speaking to the British High Commissioner in Accra, H.E. Harriet Thompson, who paid a courtesy call on him at Parliament with a delegation to understand the times in which Parliament finds itself, the need for a bi-partisan approach, and the experiences worth sharing. She also wanted to understand Parliament’s perception of the various engagement with, and support for the institution.

The Speaker underlined the need for continuous support for Ghana’s Parliament in order to strengthen the institution in its work, and said democracy will thrive in the West African sub-region only if Ghana’s democracy succeeds. “If Ghana fails, others would fail as well”, he said.

 Rt. Hon. Bagbin called for a mutually beneficial relationship between Ghana and the United Kingdom to ensure that the two countries support one another in their national agenda.

He said Ghana’s Parliament remains committed to strengthening ties with the United Kingdom, which had existed since Independence. That commitment, he said, transcends to the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA), whose mandate, Rt. Hon Bagbin believes must be reviewed.

The CPA, he explained, must cease to exist as a charity organization and transition into an international diplomatic organization, facilitates economic diplomacy, strengthening of democracy and the promotion of fundamental human rights among member associations. Ultimately, he said, the CPA should create progressive links between member countries and the United Nations.

Speaking on the nature of Ghana’s hung parliament, the Minority Leader, Hon. Haruna Iddrisu, saw the current composition of the House as a unique opportunity for Ghana’s legislature to become more assertive and enhance the concept of checks and balances in the governance process.

He stressed on the need for more dialogue and consensus building between the two sides of the House in democracy in Ghana is to be sustained and the interest of the citizens served. He expressed disquiet about the constant negative attacks by the majority group targeted at the person of the Speaker and said, that will not only traduce the Speaker’s character, image and reputation, but will only make consensus building difficult to attain and impact negatively on the ethos and integrity of the House.

Hon. Ablakwa, was of the view that the interest demonstrated by Ghanaians in the work of Parliament will lead to gradual shift of public perception from the believe that Ghana’s legislature is a lame duck, weak institution and a rubber stamp for Government’s policies.

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Indigenes of Pramkese Kodiabe in the Eastern Region who domicile in Europe have contributed to provide a facelift to the maternity ward of their Community Health Center which serves eleven communities in the Municipality.

Dr. Ranford Kwame Antwi, Chairman of the Europe chapter in his remarks underscored the importance of keeping the health center clean and ensuring that there is constant maintenance and not to allow the facility to collapse and then turn around to build a new facility.

He urged staff of the facility to see everything there as their own and give it the needed attention and care, promising that “we have bigger plan for this clinic”, he said.

The Chief of Pramkese Kodiabe, Barima Ofori Frimpong II cautioned those encroaching on the land reserved for expansion to desist from that.

The Municipal health director of Kwaebibirem Dr. Bernard Asare noted that it is their duty to ensure that everyone has access to quality health service and further noted that there are places they wished they could provide chips compound.

Again, he added that government is in partnership with the private sector to provide hospitals and noted on their part they would facilitate for the facility to become a polyclinic and later a hospital.

“We want you to continue helping and assisting, we are also working for clinics around the community to support this very one which can take care of simple conditions. We are developing chips compounds around; all of them would spring up to support the chips compound”.

 Senior Physician Assistant Harrison Atuobi thanked the health Committee for their work and added that sometimes when the going became tough they had wanted to give up but when the challenges were put before the board of the health facility they came in to assist.

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The Parliamentary Select Committee on Local Government, Decentralization and Rural Development has thrown its weight behind the Ghana Strengthening Accountability Mechanism (GSAM) project as it provides an independent, transparent and accountability on projects in the various communities.

The Chairman of the Committee, Emmanuel Akwasi Gyamfi gave the assurance of the committee’s readiness to join the advocacy for more support and the continuity of the project, when the Committee gave audience to CARE International, implementers of the Ghana Strengthening Accountability Mechanism (GSAM) project on Tuesday, February 15, 2022 in parliament.

“We are ready to work in collaboration with you to make sure that the 261 MMDAs get this training and capacity building for project implementation at the local level”, the chairman stated.

According to him, one of the major problems as a nation is issues surrounding implementation of projects at the local level, including physical infrastructure and other initiatives hence the recommendation by CARE for a policy or guidelines to be formulated by government to propel effective implementation, monitoring and evaluation of projects at the local level is a good call. “….that every project, either coming from the central government, it is coming from the local authority or where ever, there should be a laid down procedure, some guidelines for authorities to follow. For instance, we can’t have a contractor working on a project and the community is not aware of who that contractor is; I don’t think it is right. I don’t think it is right when for instance, a district assembly which is benefitting from a project is not aware of the cost of that project. So these are critical areas when all believe we need to work together to make sure that we get something done about it”, he emphasized.

Samuel Addai Boateng, Deputy Chief of Party – GSAM (Care International) said though the programme is expected to end in September this year, having run it since 2014 in selected 100 districts across the country, there is a need to institutionalize some of the positive observations to guide project implementation going forward.

He asserts that the use of community score cards by the citizenry to engage duty bearers at the district level has been very useful in terms of capital project implantation; adding that the combination of the top-down and bottom-up accountability approach which ensures that while the audit service is doing its auditing, the citizens are also monitoring from down, provides a lot of positive impact in the project implementation in the communities.

He, however, explained that they have identified some areas that require the push of the Committee, “to push them into policies, to push them into laws and other things that are within your mandate so that at the end of the day when they are documented they are something that can be institutionalized to become binding on project formulators and implementers.

Reason for the Engagement

CARE International and its partners met the Parliamentary Select Committee on Local Government, Decentralization and Rural Development to brief the committee on the Ghana Strengthening Accountability Mechanism (GSAM) project which is aimed at improving social accountability and local government transparency in Ghana.

It also presented some recommendations for considerations by the committee as follows:

• Adopt the concept of Community Development Monitors alongside sub-local structures in their community engagements and project monitoring activities
• Advocate for the Ministry of Finance to collaborate with Ghana Audit Service to strengthen the capacity of District Audit Committees to enable them to undertake regular annual performance audits fir the assemblies.
• Advocate for Assemblies to use Community score-cards in community engagement on projects and service delivery engagements, especially through the Social Audit Committees in the district.

About Ghana Strengthening Accountability Mechanisms (GEAM) Activity

The GSAM Activity is an eight-year (20142022) USAID supported Activity seeking to deepen and sustain responsive and accountable governance at the local level. it focuses on the delivery of quality services with increased accountability; specifically, supporting citizens to demand responsive governance and local authorities to improve management of policy implementation for efficient service delivery.

The Activity works with citizens to boost their participation in local government processes including planning and implementation of development projects through strengthening citizens’ oversight of capital development projects. This is aimed at improving local government transparency, accountability and performance across IQO districts in Ghana.

The Activity was initially implemented by a Consortium comprising CARE International in Ghana, OXFAM in Ghana and Integrated Social Development Centre (ISODEC), in collaboration with Ghana Audit Service and 25 other Civil Society Organizations (CSOs).

The Ghana Audit Service (GAS) under the Activity carried out performance audits of selected capital projects in 100 districts. The consortium translated the results of the audits into scorecards and disseminated in those districts. This provided citizens the opportunity to hold their District Assemblies accountable using the scorecards as the main accountability tool for engagements.

GSAM Achievements

GSAM has made significant progress towards improving and strengthening Ghana’s decentralization process, with an emphasis on citizen participation, civil society empowerment, management of capital project delivery and extensive awareness about good governance practices. Some highlights include:

• Deepened citizen participation: Over 200, 000 citizens in 100 districts have had the opportunity to engage with their district authorities on issues of capital project planning and implementation and to demand an improved performance from the District Assemblies.
• Improved quality of capital project delivery: Citizens and civil societies supported to monitor and evaluate the delivery of 387 capital projects in 50 districts between 2015 and 2020.
• Strengthened CSOs capacities: Through training and technical assistance, 25 local civil society groups have gained new capacities that empower them to collaborate with citizens to influence local decision-making processes and support development in local communities.
• Increased citizen awareness: Raised awareness about social accountability reaching more than 2.5 million citizens nationwide through news articles, radio and television programs, social media, websites and documentaries.

Dominic Shirimori/Ghanadistricts.com

The Speaker of Parliament, Alban Bagbin has served notice to the House that he does not want to leave Parliament as a Speaker and be investigated by government’s agencies. As such, the Finance Ministry should assist the House with the relevant documentations for parliament to approve the financial agreements that parliament needs to approve.

According to him he has prompted the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning on the subject matter and under scored the need to attach documentation to international agreements. “Finance Ministry, take note you need to write officially attaching agreements you have entered into”.

The various agencies which have entered into agreements, he noted the House need to know; “after one year it has not been done; we cannot depend on documents from those agencies as authentic document to work with. This is notice to the Ministry of Finance personally.  I have called the Ministry a number of times, take these things seriously; judgment debts are becoming too many in the country”, he emphasized.

He also pointed out that he does not want to be part of this and would not work on any document that is not emanating from government sources, and he knows the legal implications and would not risk that.

In the case of government financial International agreement not coming to parliament for approval, Rt. Hon Alban Kingsford Bagbin has told the House he would not be part of a situation where he would leave the House as a Speaker and later be called to any government agencies for investigation.

The Speaker made this point on the floor of the House, when Member of Parliament for Ningo-Prampram Samuel Nartey George touched on Article 181 clause (5) of the 1992 constitution in a matter relating to the states acquisition of AirtelTigo Ghana from its partner holdings.

Article 181 (5); “This article shall, with the necessary modifications by Parliament, apply to an international business or economic transaction to which the Government is a party as it applies to a loan”.

Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com