Parliament mourns crash victims; denies snub claim

Ghana’s parliament has consoled the families of those killed in Friday’s twin road crashes, as well as the survivors of the two road disasters following a backlash of the legislature by Ghanaians on social media, for sidestepping the home incident and rather observing a minute’s silence and making statements on the floor of parliament on Monday, 25 March 2019, in honour of the 50 Muslims killed by a white supremacist in New Zealand about two weeks ago, as well as the killing of about 750 people and the displacement of over 100,000 others by Cyclone Idai in Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe.

Speaker of Parliament, Professor Mike Oquaye was unhappy about the public criticism of the legislature for its silence on the accidents which killed close to 70 people.

According to him, the MP for Kintampo South, who had submitted a statement on the subject, was not available in the chamber on Monday to speak on the incident.

Professor Oquaye said parliament wanted the Kintampo South MP to lead in paying the lawmaking body’s respects to the victims of the road accident.

He said the failure of parliament to have done so on Monday did not mean the house was unconcerned about happenings in the country.

“The leadership were agreeable that she [Kintampo South MP] must be the appropriate person to lead the statement on this in this honourable house and that was not out of this honourable house not being mindful of the circumstances,” Prof Oquaye explained on Tuesday, 26 March 2019.

He pointed out that parliament is “concerned with such matters and had addressed such matters with expedition” and done so “dutifully at all relevant times”.

Apart from observing a minute’s silence in memory of the deceased, several MPs read statements on the floor on Tuesday, 26 March 2019 to commiserate with the victims and their families.