MPs are not shirts to be changed anyhow – Bagbin

The Member of Parliament for Nadowli-Kaleo Alban Kingsford Sumana Bagbin has stated that it is wrong for Constituencies to keep changing their Members of Parliament.

According to him, a constituency that keeps changing its performing MP does that to the detriment of development in the area. He explained that the more years an MP spends in Parliament, the more he learns, develop lobbying skills and gets more networks to help his constituents adding that MPs should not be changed anyhow.

“MPs are not shirts to be changed anyhow. If you change your MP anyhow…because where I can write for support my colleagues [new MPs] may not even know because of that network that you have established, the skills that you have developed to able to lobby. The level that you have reached. So if you keep on changing your MP, [don’t say] government is not developing you, it is you that is not developing yourself. So there is something good about an MP staying for long. MP is not like Executive with Power to use or misuse.”

The Second Deputy Speaker of Parliament, however, added that constituents are justified to vote out any MP who is not affable and fails to listen to his people.

He made these comments during a Public Forum organized by the Parliament of Ghana at Aburi to engage constituents of Akuapem South on the work of Parliament and get feedback.

The Minority Leader Harunu Iddrisu, concurred that Parliament is suffering from unacceptable attrition rate which affects the quality of parliamentary business.

Some chiefs at Aburi bemoaned poor road networks in rural communities in the area and illegal gobbling of stool lands by government and some traditional authorities in Ga traditional area.