“We consider ourselves as the Majority and will act as such” – Mahama Ayariga

On Tuesday, October 22, Speaker Alban Bagbin decided to suspend the House indefinitely, and the Parliament’s Minority caucus has asserted that it now has the majority position.

An inadequate number of Members of Parliament (MPs) was stated by the Speaker as the reason for the adjournment during a contentious session.

Four parliamentary seats were recently declared empty by Speaker Bagbin, which is the cause of the current standoff.

This ruling was based on a motion submitted by Dr. Cassiel Forson, the minority leader, which used constitutional rules pertaining to Members of Parliament who had either run as independents or switched parties. The seats held by MPs for Fomena, Suhum, Agona West, and Amenfi Central are among those impacted.

The Minority has insisted that the Speaker’s decision has tipped the scales in their favor, even though the Supreme Court granted a stay of execution on Bagbin’s order, preventing the seats from being immediately vacated.

In a Channel One TV interview with Vivian Kai Lokko, Mahama Ayariga, the Bawku Central MP, reaffirmed the Minority’s stance. He maintained that the National Democratic Congress (NDC) MPs would not cede their seats to the New Patriotic Party (NPP) until the Speaker revoked his decision announcing the four seats as vacant.

Ayariga said that the Minority will follow the Speaker’s instructions to adjourn and go back to their districts while they awaited a new date for the next meeting of Parliament.

He reaffirmed that until the issue is settled in Parliament, their caucus would still consider itself to be in the majority.

As both parties await the next steps, this parliamentary deadlock has increased the level of uncertainty in the legislative process.

“We’re the Majority [NDC Minority], the Speaker didn’t set aside his directive and you will recall we said that it is only when the Speaker changes his communication that we on the NDC side will review anything.

“So far as we’re concerned, the Speaker’s communication in terms of the numbers in the house still stands. He hasn’t varied anything. And so I can assure you that we consider ourselves as the Majority and will act as such, there’s no issue at all. We don’t have a problem. We will go back to our constituencies and run our election campaign, that’s all.”

Source: Ghanatodayonline.com