Sputnik V: Agyeman-Manu lied to Parliament - Muntaka tackles Afenyo-Markin

• Two leaders in Parliament have publicly disagreed on whether the Health Minister lied to the house

• Afenyo-Markin insists Agyeman-Manu was truthful to an ad hoc committee that probed procurement of vaccines

• Muntaka on the other hand says Afenyo-Markin is literally lying to cover Agyeman-Manu’s lies

Minority Chief Whip and Member of Parliament for Asawase, Mohammed-Mubarak Muntaka, has said deputy Minority Leader Alexander Kwamina Afenyo-Markin is employing lies to defend lies told by embattled Health Minister Kwaku Agyeman-Manu.

The two lawmakers have serially disagreed on the subject of whether or not Agyeman-Manu lied to a Parliamentary Committee that probed issues around the procurement of Russia-made Sputnik V vaccines.

Afenyo-Markin had in an interview with Joy FM stressed that the Minister did not lie under oath as has largely been peddled adding that Parliament’s probe committee had not at any point found that he lied.

But responding to the matter, Muntaka said: “That is absolutely crazy to even imagine. That’s not true when he says we have agreed that the Minister did not lie.

"Go back to the submission on the floor, I concluded the submission on our side and I reiterated it is not possible for the Ministry of Finance to make payments on behalf of any agency when that agency is not the one instructing the Ministry.

“And there is evidence to show that when that payment was made as far back as March, the Minister was copied, the Minister lied. That aside, we need to understand that there are so many issues around this.

“One, the breach of the procurement processes; two, the failure to bring the matter to Parliament even when the Attorney General had advised, three; he lied under oath. These are not things that you say because money has been refunded all the other issues are gone,” he added.

Muntaka added that even though in a democracy as ours everyone was entitled to an opinion, it would be better if the deputy Majority Leader stops defending the embattled minister.

He averred that Afenyo-Markin’s repeated defense of the minister had reached the extent where it sounded like an insult to Ghanaians.

“I will advise my colleague, yes; we are in a democracy, everybody can speak his or her mind, but I will advise my colleague the deputy Majority Leader, it is better he stops talking because the more he talks, the more he insults the intelligence of ordinary Ghanaians,” he stressed.

The procurement of the Russia-made vaccines have been the subject of protracted public discourse after it emerged that Health Minister Kwaku Agyeman-Manu breached laid down processes and procedures in dealing with the suppliers.

Calls continue for his resignation over malfeasance even though the supplier in question, one Sheikh Ahmed Dalmook Al Makhtoum has as it stands now, refunded over 2.4 million dollars, which is the cost of some 280,000 doses that his office failed to deliver.

The Minister is currently on a two-week leave to attend to ‘personal issues,” and the president has shown no signs of relieving him of his post.

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