THE Minority Leader in Parliament, Mr Alban Bagbin, has called for a referendum to remove certain entrenched clauses in the Constitution which are counter to the country’s democratic dispensation.
He specifically mentioned the clause which mandates the Executive, that is, the President, to appoint half of his Cabinet members from Parliament.
According to the Minority Leader, such a provision defeats the purpose of separation of powers and checks and balances, saying, "It swallows up the whole parliamentary system and makes it moribund".
Mr Bagbin was contributing to a debate on "Strengthening the Links of Accountability" at the Development Dialogue Series held in Accra last Friday.
The dialogue, which was on the theme, "The GPRS and Multi-Donor Budget Support: Strengthening the Links of Accountability", was organised by the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning the Ghana Centre for Democratic Development (CDD), the Centre for Policy Analysis (CEPA) and the World Bank, Ghana Office.
Mr Bagbin expressed satisfaction about the general legal framework within which Parliament operates but was dissatisfied with some entrenched clauses in the Constitution.
He expressed concern about the way Parliament was marginalised in the framing of the Ghana Poverty Reduction Strategy (GPRS) and said the trend should be reversed in the framing of such documents in future, since Parliament is a direct representation of the people and it is well-versed in issues at the grassroots.
The Minority Leader called for the resourcing and strengthening of Parliament to enable it to perform its role effectively for the socio-economic development of the nation.
He said resourcing Parliament is particularly important for it to discharge the duty of monitoring and evaluating the GPRS.
He described as unfortunate the practice where departments and agencies of government always approach the Executive for solutions, saying they can equally make use of Parliament, which represents their interests.
Mr Bagbin urged accounting and financial institutions, the Accountant General's Department, the media and the private sector to liaise with Parliament to pursue the common goal of accountability.
He urged Ghanaians to stand up in unity, gird their loins and work together as a people to meet the aspirations of the country.
The UNDP Country Director, Mr Alfred Sallia Fawundu, in a contribution, said there is the need to ensure accountability in all sectors of the economy, adding that “what we are going to be judged by is what amount of poverty we have been able to reduce.”
