The 2016 Member of Parliament for Obuasi East constituency, Edward Anning, in an interview debunked the notion that Ghanaian parliamentarians are rich.
He argued that due to their enormous responsibilities in their constituency and also the huge sums of monies spent on their political campaigns, most of them are always left broke.
“We owe more than the ordinary Ghanaian I can tell you. Some of us have to contract loans at high-interest rates from banks just to make up because our constituents will not understand why we won’t attend funerals and other social functions…..all these cost money,” said the former MP in an interview with Kwame Adinkra on Abusua Nkomo.
Read the full story originally published on August 5, 2016, on Ghanaweb
It has emerged that the country’s legislators are not living in affluence as it may appear to constituents and the general public at large.
The Member of Parliament (MP) for Obuasi East constituency of the Ashanti Region Edward Anning made a stunning revelation that most MPs are living in abject poverty because prevailing economic conditions have compelled them to live beyond their means.
“We owe more than the ordinary Ghanaian I can tell you. Some of us have to contract loans at high interest rates from banks just to make up because our constituents will not understand why we won’t attend funerals and other social functions…..all these cost money,” he disclosed to Kwame Adinkra on Abusua Nkomo.
He revealed that legislators are more frustrated than it is believed but their woes are always compounded when they contest internal party primaries and proceed to lose at the general polls.
“You can imagine spending so much money at the primaries and when you get to the general elections you spend more and in the end lose. That is when the real trouble begins. How to service these loans and many other issues now set in,” he stated.
The legislator added that the flashy cars and the seeming affluent living of MPs are all suffering in disguise. He explained that most of them cannot boast of GHC200 in their pockets at the end of each month.