News:
July 21, 2017
Minority Chief Whip Mohamed Mubarak Muntaka is urging his colleagues in the Majority to stop flexing and withdraw the Office of the Special Prosecutor Bill 2017 which they rushed in laying on Tuesday in an interview.
Absence of copies of the Bill flouts order 75 of the Standing Orders of the House after 24 hours, we are yet to be served with copies to make rigorous deliberation, he said.
As soon as sufficient copies of the paper for distribution to members have been received in the office of the Clerk, notice of the presentation of the paper may be placed on the order paper and as soon as Mr. Speaker announces papers of presentation, the paper shall be deemed to have been laid,” he quoted Order 75.
He further noted that, Constitutional Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Committee members do not even have a copy of the Bill, even as the Speaker had referred the Bill to them to work on.
And further dismissed assertion that, the fire outbreak at Job 600 which houses Members of Parliament is the reason for MPs not having access to the copies. “Clerks’ at the table do not have their offices at job 600 where is the Bill, it has nothing to do with job 600”
“As for verification the Speaker could have called the Clerk of Parliament do you have enough copies of the Bill, for him to say yes or no”. “The copies are not in this House I can bet you. They are now working on the Bill putting the doting the T’s and I”.
According to the Asawase lawmaker, the Bill was rushed into Parliament because the President’s first encounter with the media he had promised to establish Office of the Special Prosecutor.
“All the President will say is I have laid it today, it is left with Parliament, let us not do this politics of convenient let us take Parliament serious”, he said.
As to why the laying of the Zongo Development Fund Bill, 2017 is not generating much controversy, he noted that the Majority side had not said it was under a certificate of urgency.
By: Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/ghanamps.com