Film shooting triggers detour for Speaker and legislators

To their consternation, Mr Joseph Osei-Owusu, First Deputy Speaker and the MP for Bekwai and other members of the House were on Tuesday barred from using the Eastern Gate to enter the House.

They had to drive back and make a detour through the main entrance facing the Accra International Conference Centre to enter the House because security personnel on duty at the Eastern Gate said the gate had been blocked to allow for a film to be shot.

A discussion that followed on the matter during proceedings in the House re-echoed the need for more security for the legislators, with a directive from the First Deputy Speaker to the Leadership of the House to look at the relocation of the House, currently accommodated on space belonging to the State Protocol Department (SPD).

After the examination and correction of the Votes and Proceedings for the last sitting, Friday, November 3, 2017, Mr Mathias Kwame Ntow, MP Aowin Suaman caught the Speaker’s eye, with the complaint that “Mr Speaker, something unimaginable happened.”

Identifying Parliament as the Second Arm of the Government of Ghana, the Aowin Suaman Lawmaker wondered why the road at the Eastern Gate would be blocked without prior notice of to the House.

But the First Deputy Speaker asked “can we be guided by the Order” under which you are coming?

After mentioning some Orders, Mr Ntow told the House that he was raising the issues on the security of members of the House, adding “I hope the Chair will take a very serious view of the matter.”

Dr Mark Assibey Yeboah, Chairman of the Finance Committee of Parliament in an intervention requested the representative of the people of Aowin Suaman to use “the appropriate forum to raise that concern, if he wanted to raise issues on contempt, suggestion that the legislator should have raised the issue with the Leadership first.

Majority Leader Alhaji Muntaka Mubarak, who came to the rescue of Mr Ntow referred to Order 72 of the Standing Orders of the House, and said it was only proper that the House should be informed of any blockade.

Contributions by members wondered why there still continued to be public social gatherings and shooting of films that interfered with the work of the House.

The First Deputy Speaker, who presided over proceedings said:” I got to the Eastern Gate before I was directed and urged the leaders and the whips to take the matter up with the SPD.