UNCULTURED BEHAVIOUR SUBVERTING THE CONSTITUTIONAL ORDER
UNCULTURED BEHAVIOUR OF SOME PARLIAMENTARIANS SUBVERTING THE CONSTITUTIONAL ORDER
BY MARTIN A. B. K. AMIDU
The internet is awash with the news that some Members of Parliament yesterday exhibited both in and out of parliament unpardonable un-parliamentary behaviour amounting to contempt and rioting in Parliament. When ordinary citizens complain about their behavior we are charged with or threatened with the arbitrary and archaic procedure of contempt of parliament. We now have a golden opportunity to see how equality is equity before the law when it comes to Members of Parliament.
I have confirmed this news by just listening and watching a video showing Hon. Alhaji Mohammed Muntaka Mubarak, the Minority Chief Whip, speaking to a group of pressmen gathered around him outside what appears to be the chamber of parliament (I suspect he was speaking to the parliamentary press corps) and charging the Speaker of Parliament with exercising the discretionary constitutional and statutory powers of his office capriciously. The Constitution, Standing Orders and laws of the Ghana notwithstanding, no matter what, the last thing we expect of a true Ghanaian brought up within all our cultures is to exhibit the highest degree of decorum when speaking to others let alone to or of elder persons. I formed the impression that apart from the above contemptuous statements spoken by the Hon. Alhaji Mohammed Muntaka Mubarak outside parliament to the press he had earlier during the sitting of parliament also “registered his anger in a robust way by saying that the minority would no longer countenance any act of disrespect by the speaker...”
Another Member of Parliament, Hon. A. B. A Fusieni also speaking to Class FM’s Ekow Annan is quoted to have contemptuously said the following of the Speaker of Parliament: “For want of a better term, the Speaker has exhibited gross levels of bias that is unbelievable. In the annals of the history of parliament. I have never seen this kind of behavior.... We are going to be forced to take maybe unprecedented action that has never happened in the annals of our fourth republic...We are very close and there are a number of options available to us Minority to exploit including the impeachment of the speaker....” Our democracy is endangered when members of parliament can issue threats and use intimidatory language to rudely chastise the Speaker outside Parliament in such an uncouth manner.
Compare the above uncouthness with the decorous language of Hon. Haruna Iddrisu (Minority Leader) reacting to his not being given the floor a second time on the matter; and the equally decorous response of the Speaker in Parliament:
Minority Leader: “You know the essence of parliamentary questions is significant and integral to the exercise of oversight. Your refusal to allow me to even as Minority Leader to
proceed can only be an effort to cripple us. We respect you as chair of this house; we have a responsibility as leaders to support you in maintaining order in this house.’ He exclaimed.
Speaker: “I have consistently made it clear to both sides of the House – Majority and Minority – that no one will be allowed a double bite as I said on many occasions to both the Minority and the Majority. In all honesty you all know that. Let me make it clear that this argument was unnecessary and that in future what is going to happen is no leader shall have double bite at the chamber.”
Like it or not, the reputation and dignity of the office of the Speaker of Parliament has deliberately been brought into serious inexcusable opprobrium and disrepute both in and outside Parliament by those indecorous Members of Parliament who rioted, banged desks, wagged their figures at the Speaker and granted interviews to the media to bring the high office of the Speaker who was elected by the whole House and not by one political party into disrepute and contempt before reasonable members of the public.
I agree in toto with a quotation attributed to the Majority leader in the Daily Guide Africa that: “The majority leader said that the threat by the minority to impeach the speaker was contemptuous of parliament, according to Order 30 (j), while the riotous behavior of the minority members was equally contemptuous as captured under Order 30 (3) (a) of parliament.”
On or around 12th January 2017 the Hon. Alex Agyekum took the floor of the House to threaten and intimidate me by calling for me to be hauled to Parliament for contempt for saying nothing contemptuous of the present Parliament. In any case unbeknown to him as a blind man, so to speak, I was stepping on stones. The Hon. Ras Mubarak also this July took to the floor of the House and threatened and intimidated Mr. Sydney Casely-Hayford, a distinguished citizen and far old enough to be his grandfather, with being charged for contempt of Parliament for articulating to students at a public academic forum what had always been constitutionally protected as part of his freedom of thought and conscience but became contempt when he exercised his right to freedom of expressing those thoughts and conscience.
We elected the 275 Members of Parliament out of about 26 million citizens to show exemplary conduct to the nation in the discharge of their functions on our behalf in Parliament. Consequently, those who are calling for mere apologies to the serious dent on the distinguished and eminent Speaker’s reputation earned over several years as a University teacher, professor, lawyer, Member of Parliament and an ambassador to assuage the deliberate contempt are not helping to uphold the Constitutional order. The reputation,
dignity and honour of the office of Speaker (bi-partisanly elected) must not be allowed to be used for partisan, cheap and uncouth posturing in any way.
What is good for the goose is good for the gander. A stitch in time also saves nine. Citizens’ Vigilance for Justice demands that fellow Ghanaians join us to defend the Constitution against these contemnors. Citizens, let’s be awake; we are sovereign over Parliament and must hold it to account!
Martin A. B. K. Amidu
Citizens Vigilance for Justice
The US Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the independent counsel provisions of the Ethics in Government Act. 1978 in Morrison v Olson, 487 U.S. 654 (1988) and the Supreme Court of Ghana may be similarly persuaded that the Special Prosecutor who cannot be appointed by the President without being first nominated by the Attorney-General under Act 959 is thereby clothed with prosecutorial authority for the appointed tenure of seven years.
Sycophancy breeds autocracy which slowly erodes democracy and the rule of law, and eventually kills democracy. That is how democracies die! Parliament must, therefore, never be seen to be on the leash by the Executive arm of government in its law making functions under Article 106 of the 1992 Constitution. The Security and Intelligence Agencies Bill 2025 as presently laid before Parliament has failed to comply with the mandatory provisions of Article 106 of the Constitution to be introduced in Parliament, accepted and considered for enactment.
The Chief Justice is the head of the judicial arm of government and I am surprised that the paragraphs numbered 14 and 15 of her supplementary affidavit contain a childlike ingratiating cry, begging and appeals to the emotions of the Court and the general public without any scintilla of supporting facts. It is a patent insult to the citizens exercising their constitutional rights under 146 to petition for the removal of the Chief Justice from office.
The Judiciary is the least dangerous branch and the citizen’s hope for freedom and justice. Consequently, we must channel our efforts to defending Article 146 of the Constitution and produce cogent evidence when we allege it is being subverted by any person or group of persons. In the absence of any concrete evidence of impropriety on the part of the petitioners, the public has a vested interest in knowing the outcome of the removal process begun by the petitions submitted to the President.
With a vote of no confidence in both the President Nana Akufo-Addo/Bawumia government and the Speaker Bagbin-led Parliament on 7 December 2024, We-the-People who have proven our capability to take our destiny into our own hands must remain ever vigilant against further abuses during the balance of the tenure of the President and the 8th Parliament.
The deep polarization and intense emotions generated by the governance of the country under the Akufo-Addo/ Mahamudu Bawumia administration shows that the future stability of the 1992 Constitution is dependent on how free, fair, and transparent the 7 December 2024 elections are seen to have been managed and conducted by all the public institutions entrusted with supervising the elections. The time to defend the 1992 Constitution against election interference is NOW!
Convening parliament for two days only may be convenient for the finances of the Members of Parliament, otherwise I see no rational reason for wasting the public purse just a few days to the 2024 elections. Apart from providing a provisional budget for the incoming government on 7 January 2025, there is no emergency necessitating the Speaker wasting public funds to abridge the fourteen days to recall Parliament before 7 December 2024 for a two-day session.
Common observation throughout socialization in life and common sense teaches that intractable and intense emotional conflicts even when they appear to have been resolved leave residues which inform the next cycle of conflict between the same adversaries or their proxies. Whatever the short-term objective that the Speaker and his supporters have achieved, it will take an exceedingly long time for the centre to hold again now and in future Parliaments unless greed gives way to the love of our homeland Ghana.
Just in four years, Ghanaians are missing you as the most honest Ghanaian leader of integrity under the 1992 Constitution, a hard taskmaster, with a heart of tolerance and magnanimity. We are still looking beyond the horizon and wondering when salvation will come to Ghanaians again under the 1992 Constitution you gave to our homeland Ghana. I salute you Comrade, and assure you that as long as we live on this earth we shall continue to fight, fight, and fight for the egalitarian ideals that underpinned our revolution.
But for the folly of the NDC and the Speaker of Parliament, the House would have been in session and holding the Chief Justice’s administrative action of closing the High Court and other courts in Bolgatanga and its environs to account for her actions on the spurious reasons assigned and the unprecedented nature of her action in the history of Ghana taken so close to an election on 7 December 2024 that must be free, fair, and transparent under the 1992 Constitution.
The Speaker of Parliament needs to think long before side stepping the orders of the Supreme Court through subterfuges to preside over pushing the 1992 Constitution into the inferno of implosion instead of defending it as his oath of office and the Constitution demands. The stability and survival of the Fourth Republic of Ghana must take precedence over transactional politics, opportunism, and adventurism by groups of political elites bent on serving parochial and short-term self interests instead of the interest of the citizens of Ghana.
The 2024 elections in Ghana must be fought and won on the integrity, honesty and policy programmes of the various candidates and their political parties. The unnecessary hyping of national tensions and promotion of violence which has the propensity to implode the 1992 Constitution just for the sake of raw power for its own sake without the interests of the citizens at heart must stop. Beware of 4 June 1979! Beware of 31 December 1981! None of the two major political parties will win when they undermine and facilitate the implosion of the 1992 Constitution.
The Kissi Agyebeng inspired petition to Parliament to probe into EOCO’s failure to investigate the non-existing money laundering allegations against Cecilia Dapaah is an exercise in futility except when the self confessed corrupt National Democratic Congress (NDC) Speaker of Parliament decides to use the petition for transactional political purposes. An NDC Member of Parliament (MP) I brought up into the politics of the Fourth Republic just also confessed that one cannot be an MP without being corrupt. Is that true?
The NDC and the NPP appear to be so invested in their opposing positions and the desire to use the dynamics of gay rights to win political power that they have not stopped to think about the consequences of their actions to the sustenance of constitutionalism, democracy, and the rule of law. The elders in the room who could have sought a compromise appear to have taken sides leading to both sides engaging in a dialogue of the deaf.
“Self-preservation is the first law of nature”, and it would be political suicide for Nana Akufo-Addo to assent to the LGBTQ+ Bill being passed by Parliament into law. Nana Akufo-Addo’s long game, the aura he has built around himself as a democrat in the Western tradition, and all the ingratiation efforts he has invested in, will come to nought should he assent to the Bill upon passage. The fact that other citizens knew the difficulty the Bill was going to face when it got to the desk of the President was articulated by no less a person than Minority Leader Ato Forson.
I am raising my finger in this rejoinder against the wanton violations of the rights of the people of Ghana in the use of the military by the Government to brutalize the very electorate that brought it into power. We the people are sovereign under the 1992 Constitution and not the Speaker, Parliament, or the executive which if let alone will continue to trample upon our sovereignty with the obnoxious show in Parliament on 13 November 2023. Ghana will rise again!
Comrade Jerry John Rawlings, I salute you and you will continue to live in our hearts amidst the culture of silence in Ghana today. Every day I look beyond the horizon and wonder, when will salvation come to Ghanaians again under the 1992 Constitution you birthed? Say hi to Arikpo (GP. Captain Richard Forjeo (rtd.)), who followed you to eternity at the beginning of 2022. You are deeply missed and most fondly remembered.
The Parliament of Ghana has not proven itself in similar situations of military brutalities on citizens of being capable of providing a non-partisan and non-transactional solution or remedy unaffected by its self-interest. The ball must be left in the hands of constitutional defence activists and human rights lawyers who can speak truth to power through the process of lawfare. The 1992 Constitution must be defended at all costs.
It is time to take seriously the warning about the intention of Nana Akufo-Addo to abuse the spirit of the 1992 Constitution so he can achieve an outcome at the 2024 Presidential and Parliamentary Elections favourable to him as an insurance in his retirement. Ghana’s democracy, the rule of law and constitutionalism enshrined in the letter and the spirit of the 1992 Constitution must be defended by all patriotic citizens even if the heavens fall.
I have lived under threats of assassination, armed robbery, and the burning of my house, from this regime since 16 November 2020. The late Victor Newman aborted discussions to assassinate me then. These threats intensify any time I exercise my right to defend the Constitution just as I did on 28 June 2023 and 30 June 2023. There was a covert attack on my residence at dawn on Monday 3 July 2023. President Nana Akufo-Addo, is ultimately responsible for anything violent that befalls me or my residence. I shall not back down from defending the 1992 Constitution. No Ghanaian patriot must be cowed by threats of those violating the Constitution.
The NDC must be congratulated by all patriotic persons who act apolitically in the national interest and believe in defence of the Constitution and in the sustenance of democracy and the rule of law in Ghana. I take the view that Constitutionalism won in the Supreme Court, the Attorney-General failed woefully in weaponizing the administration of criminal justice, while democracy and the rule of law won massively at the Assin North by-elections.
Nana Akufo-Addo would not have abused the spirit of Chapter Seven (7) of the 1992 Constitution on the sanctity of the right to vote and the Electoral Commission if We the People had not in the past five and half years condoned the Government’s several abuses of power and impunity. By failing to act to defend our Constitution, we emboldened him to ignore the views of the majority of citizens and to do as he pleases. But all is not lost. Nature has its own way of dispensing justice to humanity
President Rawlings had only one term left if he won the 1996 election, which the NDC was confident he was going to win whosoever became his running mate. The transition to an NDC Government in the future without Rawlings began with the nomination of Professor Mills as Rawlings’ running mate. The Ahwois hedged their bets as the main pillars behind Professor Mills’ Vice Presidency and his future. Rawlings’ trust in his comrades blinded him from seeing the double agency in the behaviour of the Ahwois. The “Ahwoi Capture” of Professor Mills that will affect and influence the future relationship between President Rawlings and Professor Mills had begun.
The contradictory conduct of the Speaker in his rulings on 25 October 2022 and 10 November 2022 has demonstrated the need for patriotic citizens to remain ever vigilant in a split parliament in which the Speaker exhibits traits of being transactional and arrogates to himself powers and authorities not conferred upon him by the Constitution and/or Standing Orders of Parliament. This conduct of the Speaker underscores the urgency with which patriotic citizens must be ever watchful of every step and pronouncement by the Speaker of Parliament.
Our late Comrade and President Rawlings, the people of this country whom you loved so much and died for have been led into an economic mess, suffering, and poverty which is worse than what led you to risk your life to save this country and give it a viable constitution that has lasted for three decades.
Elected members of parliament are sacrificing the national good of our country for their personal selfishness and partisan interest, contravening the letter and spirit of the 1992 Constitution. Their actions are the sole reason why for some time now, “Everyday things are getting worse” for the economic and social survival of ordinary Ghanaians. The selfish economic and political power motives underpinning the divergent positions and tactics that both sides of the House used to remove two ministers from office demonstrate to Ghanaians that these members of parliament cannot be relied upon to fight for what our citizens need.
Mr. President, in these difficult economic times you have brought upon the nation of Ghana, you cannot lead the resolution, because you are an inherent part of the problem. Our people are suffering under your failed and mismanaged policies and stewardship, and your November 2022 Budget is going to impose further austerity upon Ghanaians. Listen closely to the echoes of history and avoid replaying the discordant notes of past Governments that cost this nation dearly – for as Mark Twain once said: “History never repeats itself, but it does often rhyme”.
President Nana Akufo-Addo has achieved finality in his deceptive long game with his recent national security apparatus appointments. If confirmed, these appointments will be a sign that Akufo-Addo has captured the National Security Secretariat and apparatus towards his electoral agenda for the 2024 parliamentary and presidential elections. While appearing to follow the letter of the law in making appointments to public office, the President’s long game substantively breaches the Constitution’s fundamental spirit of integrity, transparency, accountability, and merit – resulting in the actualization of a calculated and deliberate intention to undermine the 2024 electoral process. Ghana must always be put first.
This article is dedicated to the ideals of the June 4 and 31st December Revolutions, and the 1992 Constitution that sought to preserve the natural resources of Ghana for the public benefit of its Chiefs and People.
The Ghanaian electorate had been hoodwinked with a circus of deceptions since 26th November 2021 of sham disagreements amongst the Nana Akufo-Addo one-party dance ensemble in Parliament. We are now at the stage of what the two caucus in Parliament wanted and anticipated the most in the 2022 Budget season – the Budget Committee hearings and specially the accompanying allowances of various forms and shapes. The Minority enabled the appointment of the Minister of Finance together with any 2022 Budget hardships he inflicts upon Ghanaians. Judas Iscariot repented. The NDC can do the same.