John Dramani Mahama, former President of Ghana
A presiding officer does not have a vote – Mahama
Parliamentarians fought to resist E-Levy
Joewise initially approved the 2022 Budget
Former President, John Dramani Mahama, has praised the Minority Caucus in Parliament for fighting to resist the approval of E-Levy which was mentioned in the 2022 Budget reading.
His shower of praises comes on the back of the minority being staunch on their stance to refuse to be ‘intimidated’.
“Let me salute members of parliament and also salute the Rt. Hon. Speaker, for continuing to stand for our constitution and for our democracy. We support them in doing the right thing,” he stated.
According to him, he has been a parliamentarian before and has not “seen a situation where a presiding officer will preside over a vote and handover to another presiding officer so that he too can go and vote, it never happened, it undermines the constitution,” he said.
Expressing his view on the current hung-parliament he said “Indeed if some arm-twisting did not take place, for the first time in history we would have had one party holding the executive and another party controlling Parliament, NDC would have had the majority of 142 to 143 seats in this parliament,” he stated.
This he said could not actualize because presiding officers were influenced to announce constituencies for the NPP.
Background
Ghana’s Parliament on December 21, 2021, became the venue of fisticuffs with the trading of blows among members of the house.
In the full glare of the public, a debate on the 1.75 % Electronic Transaction Levy turned sour with members punching each other.
On various local media platforms, the incident was widely reported and discussed as people bemoaned what is fast becoming a feature of the 8th Parliament.