Isaac Adongo details how conversation with Ato Forson led to 'famous' Maguire statement

Isaac Adongo, the Member of Bolga Central has detailed how a conversation with then Ranking Member of Parliament’s Finance Committee, Dr Cassiel Ato Forson birthed the famous statement about Manchester United and English defender Harry Maguire in November 2022.

Speaking on Metro TV’s Good Morning Ghana on Tuesday, November 28, 2023, Isaac Adongo disclosed that post the 2022 budget reading, there were little conversations around it which prompted Dr Ato Forson to hold a conversation.

At the end of the conversation, both lawmakers on the minority side agreed to find creative ways of presenting their arguments in Parliament to enable it to take centre stage in media discourse.

Adongo iterated that his decision to draw similarities between Maguire and Vice President Dr Mahamudu Bawumia was due to how he believed that both men failed to meet the lofty expectations people had of them.

“The feedback I got for the first time is that he was uncomfortable. Rooney responded to me. At the time he was doing pretty well for England and Wayne Rooney used his record at the World Cup even though my focus was on Manchester United.

“When the budget was read it was during the World Cup and there was no excitement in the budget and the focus was on football. I recall my leader now, telling me there is no conversation about the budget so what do you do? So I decided to find something around football because that was the season.

“I decided to focus on the fact that the Vice President has not delivered as expected. He gave us very high hopes of being the Wizkid and the magic wand still had not worked. I needed to find a way to do that and at the time Maguire as talented as he is was going through very tough times. I picked that and decided to build my statement around it.

“Maguire was bought with pomp and pageantry and there were high hopes. Bawumia had been hyped as the best and most talented economic thinker similar to what we had about Maguire,” he said.

It will be recalled that in November 2022, Isaac Adongo made a mockery of Harry Maguire during a presentation in Parliament over the 2022 budget.

A year later, Isaac Adongo apologized to Maguire and commended him for turning around his performance.

"I now apologise to Harry Maguire," Adongo said. "He is a transformational footballer... now scoring goals for Manchester United."

Maguire accepted the apology in a post on X on Wednesday.

"See you at Old Trafford soon," he wrote, referring to the home of Manchester United.

The first time, Wayne Rooney responded to me. I was worried because I could have destroyed @HarryMaguire93's career - Hon. Isaac Adongo addresses his remarks about the @ManUtd defender#GoodMorningGhana #MetroTV pic.twitter.com/jza5EaneHw

— Metro TV Ghana (@metrotvgh) November 28, 2023