A mixture of songs, playing with musical instrument accompaniments, in an environment of horses and their riders, with a brimming streetlight, shone brilliantly in the precincts of Parliament the night before the investiture.
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BY: Ajoa Yeboah-Afari
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The unbelievably stormy, disgraceful scenes in Ghana’s Parliament captured on live television on Thursday, January 7, during the dissolution of the Seventh Parliament of the Fourth Republic and the beginning of the Eighth Parliament, can perhaps best be described as the stuff of nightmares.
But it was perhaps not strange that this particular transition, already noted for its controversies, would experience such chaos during its final stages.
The process of voting for a Speaker that was supposed to happen with only minor hiccoughs, if any, to pave way for the swearing in of the second term of Pesident-elect Nana Akufo-Addo, embarrassingly degenerated into protracted, serious conflict, over various issues.
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BY: Edward Acquah
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The eighth Parliament of the Fourth Republic must not function as a “rubber stamp” of Executive decisions as it had been the case since 1992, an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Ghana, Professor Ransford Gyampo, has urged.
According to him, the nature of the eighth Parliament where the ruling party would not command a majority in Parliament presented an opportunity for Parliament to effectively play its role of checking the Executive.
“I expect the eighth Parliament of the Fourth Republic to play its role as a counter-veiling authority to the powers of the Executive. From 1992, they have functioned nearly as rubber stamps of Executive decisions. They have functioned as merely agents who have not been able to check the exercise of Executive powers because whoever wins the Executive presidency also commands majority in Parliament,” Prof. Gyampo stated in interview with the Daily Graphic.
A cross-section of residents in the Shama District have condemned the chaotic incident that occurred during the inauguration of the 8th Parliament of the Fourth Republic, describing it as “unnecessary and unacceptable”.
According to them, the scenes witnessed in the august House on Wednesday had subjected the country to international ridicule and tainted the country’s hard-earned democratic reputation on the African continent.
The people noted with grave concern particularly the behaviour of Mr Mohammed Muntaka Mubarak, Member of Parliament (MP) for Asewase and Mr Carlos Ahenkorah, MP for Tema West, describing their actions as an affront to parliamentary democracy.
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