Coronavirus: Parliament must debate lockdown – Ablakwa
Parliament should not be excluded from discussions for a lockdown in Ghana because of coronavirus, the Ranking Member on the Foreign Affairs Committee of Parliament, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, has said.
The Member of Parliament (MP) for North Tongu Constituency has requested the leadership of Parliament to include COVID-19 debate in their agenda before the House rises in a week.
For him, the COVID-19, that has killed three people, with 132 infections, could not be relegated to the background while discussions on other issues persist.
“This is a House of debates. There are many debates out there outside Parliament. Should there be lockdown or not? What do we think as members of Parliament?” he queried as he made a submission on the Floor of the House on Friday, March 27.
In his view, COVID-19 was the most urgent issue. To this end, he noted,” We cannot adjourn without making our positions known”.
He wanted the government to tell citizens about the economic impact buffers and other interventions to mitigate the consequences of a lockdown.
Mr Ablakwa insisted that legislators “have views on that; we should be allowed to share them.”
Health experts, organisations and some public figures have made a strong call for a partial or total lockdown.
The Ghana Medical Association (GMA) has called for an immediate shutdown except for providers of essential services.
However, President Nana Akufo-Addo has said that a lockdown would have an enormous socio-economic impact, especially on wage-earners and ordinary citizens.
Mr Akufo-Addo is due to address the nation on the latest updates concerning the pandemic Friday evening.
Why did they not attend the Parliamentary session on Saturday to discuss the Fund issue and now talking about the lockdown issue.
This just shows how selfish they are.
The current NDC reminds me of a statement the Late President Attah Mills told me in 2002, in a village setting, in the presence of an NDC Member of Parliament, and I quote ” If the leader has surrounding him,selfish ,greedy, corrupt, self-opionated, into politics to enrich themselves, there is nothing the leader can do and succeed, and my son I am surrounded by 90% of them”.
The Member of Parliament was shocked that he would make such a statement to me as a stranger.
This begs the question as to shows how the Minister of Finance with his Deputies will allow the misappropriation of public funds by paying double salaries to Parliamentarians . The recipients would have been dealt with appropriately as would in most democratic countries, but in Ghana it is taken as the norm, but would jail a goat, plantain, palm nuts thief God have Mercy on Ghana