Vetting: Some nominees seemed dishonest – Ablakwa

The Minority in parliament will soon put out a statement explaining that some ministerial nominees who have been vetted by the Appointments Committee of Parliament seemed to conceal the truth when they appeared before the committee, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, Member of Parliament for North Tongu, has said.

According to Mr Ablakwa, who is also a member of the committee, some of the nominees who were asked about how they were going to fulfil promises the New Patriotic Party (NPP) and its presidential candidate made ahead of the 2016 elections claimed they were unaware of those promises or that they were not captured in the manifesto. These, he said, were surprising because statements made on campaign platforms are serious statements that must be given all the attention they deserve.

Speaking in an interview with Chief Jerry Forson, host of Ghana Yensom on Accra100.5FM on Monday January 23, Mr Ablakwa said: “Very soon we (Minority) will put out our report suggesting that some of the nominees were not truthful witnesses to the Committee. I was quite surprised that some of the nominees appeared to suggest that they knew nothing about the promises that were made to us by the NPP as a political party before the elections, and so they are not things they are planning to implement.

“For example, Nana Akufo-Addo went to the Brong Ahafo region and promised that those who fell victim to the DKM microfinance saga would be paid back their monies if he won the elections, but when we asked the Finance Minister-designate (Ken Ofori-Atta), he said he never heard about such a promise and that it had not been captured in the manifesto.

“That is serious. This is a minister preparing the budget which will come to us (parliament) as soon as this quarter is over. By March, parliament will start working on the budget for the new government in 2017 and so it is surprising that the person who will come and deliver the budget said he knew nothing about the DKM promises Nana Aufo-Addo made.”

Mr Ablakwa added: “I also asked him about the promise to pay all contractors in the first 100 days in office, a promise President Akufo-Addo made when he met Ghanaian contractors sometime in October last year, it is quite shocking that the Finance Minister-designate said he never heard this promise and that it had also not been captured in the NPP manifesto.

“These are some of the issues that do not show principle in our body politic and these are matters we intend to pursue further because it doesn’t send the right signal. At the end of the day, manifesto pledges and statements on campaign platforms must be taken seriously. To create the impression that we can say anything just for votes but when we come into power then we start pretending that we didn’t say those things is not fair to the Ghanaian.”