He said the Minority has been deceiving Ghanaians to think they have the people’s interest at heart but in reality firmly tied to the apron strings of the Majority Caucus in such a manner that despite the equally divided parliament, the President has succeeded in making the legislature led by Speaker Alban Bagbin an appendage of the executive.
Mr Amidu’s views follow the Minority’s participation in approving the GHC145.4 billion Appropriation Bill 2021 despite publicly being against some portions of the 2021 budget.
Mr Amidu in a write up described the approval of the Appropriation Bill as the Minority’s third betrayal to Ghanaians.
“The doubting Thomas’s who did not believe that the consensus-building meeting between the equally divided Minority, and Majority was a choreographed compromise that raped and defiled the integrity of the Constitution and the rule of law in enabling the rejected 2022 Budget to be reinstated through a side door on 30th November 2021 as an approved 2022 Budget should tell Ghanaians the foundation upon which the Appropriation Bill, 2021 was approved in a bipartisan manner in the wee hours of Saturday, 18th December 2021,” he stated.
Below are details of Mr Amidu’s statement:
2021 BUDGET APPROPRIATION BILL - HE WHO PAYS THE PIPER CALLS THE TUNE IN NANA ADDO’S ONE-PARTY KABUKI DANCE ENSEMBLE: BY MARTIN A. B. K. AMIDU
In the wee morning of Saturday, 18th December 2021, the Parliament of Ghana approved the Appropriation Bill, 2021 for GH¢145.4 billion for the consideration and signature of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to become law to govern the Government’s planned expenditure for 2022 fiscal year. The rhetoric of the rejected 2022 Budget and the Approved 2022 Budget which had formed the basis of the Nana Akufo-Addo’s one-party Kabuki dance ensemble ended successfully in the way the President knows best. He who pays the piper calls the tune!
The Minority caucus has been firmly tied to the apron strings of the Majority caucus in Parliament in such a manner that despite the equally divided parliament excitement that engulfed Ghanaians after the 2020 Parliamentary elections, the President has been able to demonstrate how such a legislature could easily be made an appendage of the executive chariot. The third betrayal which was consummated with the active participation of the Minority in the wee hours of Saturday, 18th December 2021 warrants another award to the President to the high league of democratic-autocratic “Family and Friends” world leaders. But our President is also an innocent looking flower – “beware of Greeks bearing gifts”, is the saying.
The doubting Thomas’s who did not believe that the consensus building meeting between the equally divided Minority, and Majority was a choreographed compromise that raped and defiled the integrity of the Constitution and the rule of law in enabling the rejected 2022 Budget to be reinstated through a side door on 30th November 2021 as an approved 2022 Budget should tell Ghanaians the foundation upon which the Appropriation Bill, 2021 was approved in a bi-partisan manner in the wee hours of Saturday, 18th December 2021.
Only four days previously, on 13th December 2021 the Minority Leader, Mr. Haruna Iddrisu, in a face-saving manner of his side’s betrayal of the trust Ghanaians put in the split parliament told the entire world in writing in letter with reference number OP/DML/020 of even date addressed to the First Deputy Speaker inter alia, that:
“Kindly take note that the NDC Minority Caucus, which I lead and my good self, vehemently disagree with your position on the motion and your conduct in this matter. We take a strong view that your conduct affronts Orders 79, 81, 82 and 90 of our Standing Orders and can no longer be tolerated. In this regards, we are resolved to pursue the matter further with the Right Honourable Speaker upon his return.”
This letter was preceded by an irrevocable commitment made to the people of Ghana in an interview granted by the Minority Chief Whip, Alhaji Mubarak Muntaka, to Joy FM in which he was reported to have said that “… the resolve of the Caucus is aimed at safeguarding parliamentary procedure and holding the government accountable”. He is quoted to have said that:
“We believe that his (Joseph Osei-Owusu) refusal to admit that motion is very biased. The [standing] order he quoted 13(2) to reject the motion, in our view has no relation completely with the mission that we are demanding, so we are responding officially to him…. The Minority Leader is signing a letter to remind him that this is very unfair and we believe that he is abusing his office. He is leaving us with no other option than to wait for Mr. Speaker himself to return and then we will exploit that avenue.”
The foregoing are the words of two Honourablemen and Leaders of the Minority in an equally divided Parliament which every Ghanaian had every reason to believe were spoken with honour and integrity befitting their respective status and offices. But by the time the Speaker of Parliament was reported to have arrived in the country from his medical trip to Dubai these same two Honourablemen quoted above had led their side of Parliament in the consideration of the estimates for the Ministries, Departments and Agencies, and by 16th December 2021 had started actively participating in the approval by the plenary of Parliament of those estimates. Class FM for instance reported that:
“Ghana’s parliament on Wednesday, 15 December 2021, approved the sum of GHS 921,843,000.00 for the services of the Ministry of Transport and its agencies to carry out their programmes and activities for the 2022 fiscal year ending 31 December 2022.
The house has also approved the annual estimates totalling GHS575,970,000.00 for the services of the Ministry of Railway Development for the year ending 31 December 2022 instead of the required capital expenditure of GHS 2,520,033,185.00
In another development, the house has approved the sum of GHS574,856,000.00 in annual estimates for the services of the Ministry of Environment, Science, Technology and Innovation for the year ending 31 December 2022.”
This conduct of active participation in considering and approving the estimates while deceiving the public of eventually challenging the decision rescinding the rejected 2022 Budget was a clear surrounded of any honour and integrity to be able to challenge the reinstatement of the rejected Budget on 26th November 2021 as the approved 2022 Budget on 30th November 2021.
Ghanaontheglobe.com reported that:
“Information available to Ghanaontheglobe.com indicate that Ghana’s number three as he calls himself arrived in the country on the afternoon of Monday, 13th December, 2021…. Since the Speaker has arrived in the country he will in no time take over his legitimate position and preside over the rest of the meeting.”
The DailyGuide Network on the 14th December 2022 conjectured that he was to arrive that evening.
On 14th December 2021 the Majority Leader called the bluff of the Minority Leadership vowing to wait for the arrival of the Speaker by adopting the conflict style of calling the honour and integrity of the Speaker into question by insinuating that he had approved the Minority’s Motion to rescind the Majority’s 2022 Budget whilst in Dubai. He is quoted by Citi News to have stated in an interview that:
“The First Deputy Speaker is assuming full responsibility for the transaction of business in the Chamber, but my understanding is that the Rt. Hon. Speaker has minuted on the motion [from the Minority] that he has admitted it. If that is the case, then we are in for something dangerous.”
In a typical “he who pays the piper calls the tune” fashion the Majority Leader, who is a Minister of State, had the audacity to equate the Minority to a child who has lost a fight to another child adversary and threatens the adversary by saying that: “when my father comes you will see what he will do to you”. The Majority Leader in an interview granted to Citi Newsroom on the morning of 15th December 2021 made a riposte to the Minority Leadership when he stated that:
“There are colleagues who said they were upset, but they are now together in committees considering estimates. If the budget is rejected, why are you together considering the estimates? How can you come back and say that we should go back and reject the budget?” I think that will be taking us back. We should allow sleeping dogs to lie.”
Who can blame the Majority Leader for being patronizing to the Minority caucus whom he had successfully recruited as the Minister for Parliamentary Affairs on behalf of the executive arm of government since the first and second betrayals? And the Minority’s father, the substantive Speaker of Parliament, eventually arrived from Dubai to be a Daniel come to judgment or so we all thought. Whatever date of arrival one chose, the Speaker of Parliament was at least in Ghana on the night of 14th December 2021. Parliament continued with its normal business without the public hearing or seeing the Speaker Presiding in Parliament.
On the morning of 16th December 2021 before Parliament convened Mr. Kwasi Parker Wilson, the parliamentary correspondent for Joy FM interviewed Mr. Murtala Mohammed from the Minority side, and Mr. Egyapa Mercer, from the Majority side which is published online under the title: 2022 Budget Controversy: Minority mounts pressure on Speaker to reverse approval of the budget (16-12-21) Joy TV.” The Minority represented by Murtala Mohammed told the interviewer, amongst other things, that he expected “the Speaker to do nothing else than to reverse the decisions Hon. Osei Owusu had taken.” Mr. Egyapa Mercer for the Majority told the interviewer that the Speaker could not reverse the decision approving the 2022 budget “as the matter is mute…. He has no power to overturn it….”
After a long wait, the Speaker finally entered the Chamber of Parliament and decided to make a statement on the 2022 budget challenges as the topic of his official communication. The Speaker found everything unconstitutional, and contrary to the Standing Orders of Parliament and conventions of Parliament with the conduct and decisions taken in his unavoidable absence by the First Deputy Speaker of
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