In the 2020 general election, Ghanaians gave President Nana Akufo Addo a second term. In the parliamentary elections, there was a split right down the middle.
The governing NPP secured 137 seats, while the opposition NDC secured 137. There was a single independent candidate. The independent candidate threw his lot in with the NPP, thus giving the NPP a slight edge over the NDC.
The expectations of the eight parliament were high. The creation of a level-playing field raised high expectations among citizens that the Eighth Parliament was going to raise the bar of parliamentary democracy a notch higher in the supreme national, rather than parochial political party or personal interests.
But three time Member of Parliament, Dr. Dominic Akuritinga Ayine, has admitted that MPs have not handled the situation well.
Dr. Ayine, MP for Bolgatanga East in the Upper East Region, speaking with A1 Radio’s Mark Smith on the Day Break Upper East Show (DBUE), explained that MPs could have chosen to work with the system better.
“If you take the House now, no party has a clear majority, and so decision-making becomes more difficult, especially when these things are deeply partisan. Of course, everything that generates partisan interest can lead to deep partisanship within the House, and you can understand where parties take entrenched positions, but you don’t have the numbers to be able to break the gridlock. That is where we have a problem with the hung parliament. We haven’t handled it well, to be honest with you,” he said.
Dr. Ayine explained that the hung parliament should have created the atmosphere for more negotiations and concession building, but that hasn’t been the case.
“With the numbers that we have now, the best approach would have been consensus-building, meaning that leadership would start the conversation, come back to the middle bench, and then also rope in the back benchers.”
“I don’t see that happening all the time; that is why you see all the drama that is taking place on the floor of Parliament all this time,” he said.
Dr. Ayine explained that the drama in the eighth parliament was not seen in the seventh parliament because the NPP had a clear majority.
Source: A1Radioonline.Com|101.1MHZ|Mark Kwasi Ahumah Smith|Bolgatanga|
