Legislature budget slash: Pratt 'disturbed' Asante Bediatuo unilaterally wrote letter to Parliament

Managing Editor of the Insight newspaper wants a full-scale inquiry to be launched into claims that Nana Asante Bediatuo, Executive Secretary to the President, wrote a letter cutting down budget estimates for the judiciary and legislature on the blind side of President Akufo-Addo.

The President announced, in a letter to Parliament last week, that the budget for the Legislature will be slashed by ¢119 million while that of the Judiciary will go down by ¢77 million.

Majority Leader Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bons, speaking to JoyNews in an interview, revealed Nana Asante Bediatuo had unilaterally written a letter cutting down budget estimates for the judiciary and legislature.

He noted that the matter had not been concluded but ''on account of what had been happening earlier, the Secretary wrote the letter."

“I think its a yesterday issue but we have agreed that the proper thing should be done”, he added.

Discussing the issue on Peace FM's ''Kokrokoo'', Kwesi Pratt was alarmed by the action of the Secretary to the President, wondering how the latter could act without the consent of the President.

''This is disturbing....for a Majority Leader to accuse the Secretary to the President that he's written a letter to Parliament on his own authority without the notice of the President, I think it's a serious matter...So, next time, when somebody gets a letter from the Secretary to the President, how are we supposed to treat that letter. That's the issue. So, for me, it's a very, very serious matter'', he stressed.

''Nana Asante Bediatuo is not a toddler. He is somebody who understands his job too well. He is a senior lawyer. So, how could he have committed such an error assuming he did?'', he queried.

He called for full investigations into the matter, stating emphatically ''you can't brush this matter aside. We have to thoroughly investigate it''.