News:
February 4, 2022
Leader of the Liberian delegation to the ECOWAS Parliament, Edwin Melvin Snowe Junior has said the issue of coup d’état leading to immediate dissolution of democratically elected National Assemblies would be up for discussion in the upcoming Session of the Parliament in Liberia next month.
According to him at their last virtual session last week Friday, January 28, 2022, the Rt. Hon Sidie Mohammed Tunis mentioned it and is up for debate by the Committee on Political Affairs, Peace, Security and African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), that he chairs.
Mr. Snowe Junior said this in a telephone interview when Ghanamps.com wanted know how the issue of dissolution should be handled in the wake of military coups in Mali, Guinea and Burkina Faso which is denying them of representation in the Community Parliament.
“We are now going to debate and formulate a policy on the matter like Burkina Faso, our colleagues there were democratically elected and someone comes and shot few guns in the air, suspends the entire constitution and parliament by the sound of the gun?”
He advocated on the need to putting mechanisms in place to protect democracy. “Where our colleagues were democratically elected, you cannot come and shoot guns in the air and dissolve the entire parliament against the entire aspiration of the people”.
“Democracy should not start with the presidency, once it is affected, it affects all other institutions; there would be a debate on that and how we proceed on that matter”, he emphasised.
And recounted the issue of Mali with the military coup there, stating that the transitional government brought representatives and MPs within the Parliament argued that people not elected should not be part of a democratic process, and they went to the Community Court of Justice.
And the court gave a ruling for the transitional representatives to be recognised; then just about accepting them into the Parliament there was another coup in Mali.
Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com