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Minority Leader Haruna Iddrisu is a disgrace to Ghana's democracy

Haruna Iddrisu Haruna Iddrisu

Sat, 22 Feb 2020 Source: Charles Yeboah (Sir Lord)

I don't know if it's the copycat of what took place in America's Congress, where the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi ripped her copy of the speech (The State Of The Union) by President Donald Trump, after the latter refused a handshake with the former before his delivery, that the minority and the largest opposition party in Ghana's Parliament want to foist on Ghanaians.

It's the most mortifying and nauseous display a political party would display under a democracy that have the interest of the public at heart.

What make the actions of the Minority Leader unbecoming of a 21st-century leader, and not worth his sort with the accolade bestowed on him as a leader of one side of our polarised political divide, is the reason behind the staging of the walkout prior to the President Nana Akuffo Addo's delivery of the State of The Nation's Address (SONA) - 'because we don't need a new electoral register as the opposition party going into elections'.

Just because of your opposition to a compilation of new register by the electoral commission, governance of the country should come to a standstill?

Would the walking out from the chamber compel the president to dictate to the electoral commissioner, Jane Mensah, who has been given a constitutional mandate to perform her duties, shield it and follow the desire of the opposition even if it'll not serve the interest of the common Ghanaian? Or you stay in the chamber to go through the exercise, couldn't it have spoken volumes about how well you understand democracy?

You as the opposition (National Democratic Congress - NDC) with a "misleader" staged a walkout, your seats were filled by the ruling party's (New Patriotic Party - NPP) Members of Parliament. The President had no opposition in the house, he regurgitated to the Ghanaian people what he wanted us to hear. Your presence with disapproval facial expressions could have pricked on the conscience of the President if he was hoodwinking Ghanaians with misleading figures. But no, you behaved like the litigant wife who believes she's always right and would not sit down for amicable solution with the husband so a happy home would be created.

One thing you're forgetting to abreast yourself with as the opposition with the hefty duty to represent the voiceless Ghanaian is that: though in the American case the opposition disagreed with the president on many scores, but when it came to the total interest of the nation, both sides of the House was united, applauded together and occasionally accorded the President with a standing ovation. A typical scenario was when Juan Guardo was mentioned by President Trump as the "legitimate president of Venezuela".

How Nancy Pelosi stood up and clapped, I'd not thought one bit that she'll at the end rip the President's speech. Why, because in that line she saw how the United States Of America stands to gain economically if the Venezuelan opposition leader replace Nicolas Maduro as the president of the oil rich South American nation.

Today, your faithful supporters in the NDC who cannot understand the technical words the President used in the SONA are lost as to what the health of the state is, because you'd not listened to it in order to explain to them the truths and the lies in there.

Or, since you staged a walkout, you did command your followers to do same, without following the SONA in the media? And that you've sold your seats to the incumbent for Ghana to become a one-party state as the President wished it, ending his speech today, (20/2/2020) in the chamber?

When walking out, did you see the founder of your party, President Jerry John Rawlings seated with his wife preparing to listen to the SONA without any preconceptions?

Indeed, I reiterate it, unapologetically, the Minority Leader is a disgrace to Ghana's democracy. He never showed any leadership skills, even after with false smiles welcomed the President to the chamber as tradition demanded.

The last time I descended on the Parliament with a scourge, it was on the flesh of the Majority Leader Osei Kyei-Mensah Bonsu, the Member of Parliament for Suame Constituency in the Ashanti Region, and the Minister for Government Business, who boastfully said "the long served leaders in the Parliament house are to be maintained and not replaced by inexperienced people" (sic).

I questioned the fruits we've harvested from his over two decades experience in the House, and how well it's fed Ghanaians so he demands from us an eternal stay in the chamber.

Here we are today, one of the long-serving Parliamentarians in Haruna Iddrisu, the Minority Leader, either misled by his party hierarchy, or he misleading others, without any care for the money spent on him by Ghana's exchequer, leave the House with a childish and preposterous excuse.

Our world today does not need these ilks of people's representatives to further the dream of the NEW WORLD ORDER.

The patriotic Ghanaian youth with the burning desire to erect again our fallen walls from the debris are with powers bestowed on us by our forebears who still turn in their graves seeing how lagging our progress is, say: *the old wine has lost its shelf life, we can't continue to take it as sour as it's. A new wine that has been brewed organically and needs a new bottle would be marketed to the Ghanaian very soon, and Ghana would be GREAT AGAIN.*

Long Live Ghana!

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Columnist: Charles Yeboah (Sir Lord)