Majority leader calls for introspection on election of party executives

Majority Leader and Minister of Parliamentary Affairs, Mr. Osei Kyei-Mensah Bonsu, has called on the two major political parties to do introspection on the election of party national executives to reflect the stipulation of the Constitution as well as reduce corruption.

The Majority Leader observed that, “if one is to be blunt, the parties spend too heavily on these elections and the individual aspirants overspend” and added that such process appeared to sow seeds of corruption and therefore called on the two major parties to re-examine it.

He said Article 55 of the 1992 Constitution provides that “members of the national executive committee of a political party shall be chosen from all the regions of Ghana”, and questioned how elections allowed for members of the national executive committee to be chosen from all the regions as the Constitution obligates the parties if they continued to do elections.

The Majority Leader said this in an opening statement at a post budget workshop for all members of Parliament in Koforidua, in reference to the ongoing NDC National Delegates’ Congress, which was ongoing at the Trade Fair Centre and mentioned the NPP Congress also held recently in Koforidua.

The one-day workshop was to equip Members of Parliament with the necessary skills and competences for the debate on the financial policy and the 2019 Budget Statement presented by the Minister of Finance, which is to commence on Tuesday November 21 at the House of Parliament.

To facilitate that, experienced team of resource persons from governance institutions took the MPs through various topics that were expected to help them understand areas such as policy underpinnings of the budget, macroeconomic and fiscal management strategies, revenue mobilization mechanism and expenditure rationalization policies.

The Majority Leader said the national budget, which was a fundamental tool for the implementation and ensuring the sustainability of government programs must be carefully interrogated to ensure that it met the basic tenets of prioritization and value for money.

He said to enable Parliament do its work effectively and efficiently in playing a role in government mandate to pursue pragmatic measures and polices, members of the legislature needed to understand and fully appreciate policy objective underpinning the 2019 budget.

The Minority Leader Alhaji Haruna Iddrisu on his part called on government to be clear on its policy directions citing for instance the one million dollar to constituencies which was fuelling serious tension between the respective members of parliament, the assemblies and the Ministry of Special Initiatives.

He said if care was not taken the conflict between these three institutions as to who has the right to discuss the said money would be more than the conflict between MPs and their MMDCEs and assured that Parliament would do careful scrutiny as to the allocations to the various sectors to ensure that Ghanaians derived the optimum benefits.