Whatsup News is gathering that the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) faces an imminent implosion as a cross-section of the party’s base are extremely angry at their parliamentarians for ineptly running away from defending the 2022 budget and allowing the Minority to vote to reject it.
The Majority of MPs are belatedly attempting to validate the discarded budget which contained several controversial policies that led to it being torpedoed by the Ghanaian parliament.
But according to a circulating statement on NPP communication platforms, there is no way the party ranks think their incompetent MPs can overturn the rejection of the discarded budget.
“Our MPs simply acted unreasonably. How can a majority side with your budget statement on the table to be decided upon walk out of Parliament, simply because the Speaker asked the finance minister and non-members to leave the Plenary,” read one of the angry outbursts from one of the NPP loyalists on their communication platform as gleaned by Whatsup News.
“This should serve as a lesson to those our national and regional executives who wickedly, unjustifiably and unpatriotically disqualified well-loved and accepted people from contesting in the party’s primaries, hence our loss of over twenty seats to the NDC,” the angry statement noted.
Meanwhile, the Speaker of Parliament, Rt. Hon. Alban Sumana Bagbin has responded to accusations by the Majority New Patriotic Party (NPP) in Parliament that he unconstitutionally conducted the vote that saw the rejection of the 2022 budget without the presence of the Majority and the least requirement of 138 MPs to be present.
In a statement, the Speaker said when the vote on the 2022 budget was called last week Friday, there actually was at least one Majority MP within the Chamber of Parliament where the vote took place. This summed up the number of MPs in the chamber to 138 and thus the votes rejecting the budget was valid.
The Speaker explains: “Please let it be known that there were more than 137 MPs on the Floor when I put the question for the approval or rejection of the Economic Policy and Financial Statement of the government for the 2022 financial year often referred to as the Budget for 2022. After the rejection of the request by the Minister of Finance to be given more time to consult the expanded leadership of Parliament, one member of the Majority Caucus came to sit on the last row of the seats on the Majority side by the side-door facing the Speaker’s lobby. That took the number of attendants at that moment to 138. So when the question was put by me to the Plenary, the Hon. Gentleman remained silent.”
Bagbin added, “I am asking Ghanaians to please disregard the survival antics by the ever loquacious Leader of the Majority Group in today’s hung Parliament. The budget was lawfully rejected!”
Majority Group MPs have been whining since the 2022 budget presented by Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta, was resoundingly rejected by a one-sided Parliament on Friday.
Unable to marshal all their members, the Majority side had resorted to delay tactics after the Minority had made it clear they would reject the budget on account of the unpopular e-levy and the government’s refusal to make a budgetary allocation to the Keta sea defense project.
As part of the build-up to the rejection, Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta who had been snubbing Parliament after presenting the budget had run back to the floor and requested to be given the opportunity to persuade both sides of the House about the merits of the contents of the budget, including the controversial e-levy.
However, when the matter was put to vote, Ofori-Atta’s prayer was rejected causing the Speaker to ask him to leave the Chamber along with all non-MPs.
This infuriated the Majority who staged a walkout. After the walkout, the vote was called and all 137 MPs of the Minority side voted against the budget.
The Majority has since been claiming that the Speaker had engaged in unconstitutional conduct when he called the vote in the absence of the Majority. They have since vowed to get the vote reversed on Tuesday.
However, the Speaker makes it clear he did not engage in any illegality.
