Parliament has resumed sitting after it was suspended for an hour.
This was after leaders from both sides of the House had complained about the poor attendance in the Chamber ahead of the second day of the budget debate.
Parliament had earlier suspended sitting around 10:30am due to a low turn out but The Ghana Report has gathered that proceedings started again at 11:30am.
Ghana’s Parliament has 169 MPs on the Majority (New Patriotic Party) side while the Minority National Democratic Congress has 106 MPs.
However, on the second day they were to debate the government’s proposal for expenditure and revenue collection next year, only 19 were present from the Majority side and at least 30 recorded on the side of the Minority.
Ranking Member on the Finance Committee of Parliament, Cassiel Ato Forson said the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) MPs are deliberately absenting themselves from the proceedings.
But the Deputy Majority Chief Whip, Moses Anim, disagreed with the allegation of the ranking member.
According to him, his colleagues were in the office preparing to join proceedings.
Meanwhile, the Speaker of Parliament, Professor Mike Aaron Ocquaye has warned of punitive measures against MPs who habitually report late to the House, lamenting that it affects House’s business.
This is not first time in the history of this Parliament the Speaker of Parliament called time on a sitting because of lack of quorum.
On December 20, 2017, the Speaker suspended sitting—the second in three days over recurrent absenteeism.
By 10 a.m., that day when the day’s business was to start, only 43 MPs were the floor of the House when at least 91 MPs were needed to constitute a quorum.
Also read when it suspended sitting earlier https://www.theghanareport.com/speaker-cant-find-enough-mps-to-debate-2020-budget/