MPs angry over budget cut

Parliament on Monday approved Ghc44 billion (Ghc44,021,266,921) budgeted for spending by the government in the 2015 fiscal year.

Appropriation Bill to that effect was passed before parliament went for the Christmas recess.

Parliament will resume for the first meeting of the third session of the sixth parliament on January 27, 2015.

Before the passage of the appropriation bill, a cross-section of parliamentarians from both sides had urged the house to ‘throw away’ their budget because the president had decided to slash part of the amount requested for its operational and development expenditure.

The president of the land, who is the sole person to endorse the budget of parliament, slashed the budgeted amount from Ghc267,249,602 to Ghc185,194,572 thus incurring the displeasure and anger of parliamentarians.

Leading the crusade to reject the budgeted amount for parliament, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Member of Parliament for Adansi Asokwa, K.T. Hammond, said completely rejecting or throwing the budget away would send strong signals to the president that parliament is on its own and completely independent of the executive.

He wondered why President Mahama would slash the amount requested by parliament while he superintends over overspending at the Flagstaff House.

“Mr. speaker, I am urging my colleagues to unite and throw this budget into the dustbin because it is woefully inadequate for our operations as the second arm of government,” he urged.

The speaker, Edward Doe Adjaho, had to intervene for members to accept what had been approved and work with it and  further make an additional request in the supplementary budget.

There had been proposals for the lobbies of parliament to be refurbished and new furniture provided.

The education sector as usual, had the largest chunk of budgeted expenditure of over Ghc6 billion, while the health sector followed with over Ghc3 billion.