…from delivering sessional address

Contrary to officialdom’s reason for rescheduling the State of the Nation’s Address to Tuesday, February 25 this year, The Al-Hajj can confirm that President John Dramani Mahama would have been an unwelcome visitor to the August House if he had dared gone there today to carry out his constitutionally mandated duty under article 67 of the 1992 constitution.

Although both sides of the House, majority and minority are on the same wave length in so far as what they described as the ‘shabby’ treatment of the legislator by the executive, the minority in the House, The Al-Hajj has uncovered had prepared a hostile reception for the President, which among other things was to embarrass him in the eyes of the international community had he stepped his foot in the chamber of Parliament as initially planned.

Overly pregnant with venom, Members of Parliament of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), who are yet to come to terms with Mr Mahama’s presidency after boycotting almost all his major activities, had planned to humiliate the President with an unending and thunderous chanting of ‘tweaaa’ throughout his address.

Information picked by this paper has it that because the NPP members could not participate in the last sessional address due to their own intransigence, they had wanted to use today’s address to ‘squeeze’ the President before joining their colleagues on the majority side to ‘punish’ him for been insensitive to their plight.

What is said to have irked the legislators including parliamentary staff is that they regard the President as one of them who appreciate the challenges MPs go through, especially when he has also served as a legislator for several terms and would have expected a good working relationship with him like what they are experiencing with Speaker Doe Adjaho, who is also a former legislator of long-standing.

Notwithstanding the dangers inherent in ‘manhandling’ their own party leader, the NDC MPs according to a deep-throat source were to join ranks with their counterparts on the minority side to demand what has been denied them especially, under Mahama’s presidency.

The MPs are of the view that whiles the Executive was engaged in profligate spending by releasing monies for the refurbishment of the Peduase Lodge, Osu Castle and Flag Staff House and other miscellaneous works, the President and his Finance Minister have failed to release funds to furnish the almost completed Job 600 office complex which is to serve as offices for the MPs.

Again, both sides of the House argued that whiles the President and the Finance Minister have constantly complained of the non-availability of funds as a result of which part of their salaries and other statutory funds are in several months’ arrears, the Presidency readily makes money available for the president’s expensive travels whenever the occasions demand.

The legislators said their pennilessness has constrained them from carrying out their duties as required of them by the laws of the land. The MPs say they cannot carry out their committee works because there is no money to run their activities.

Another major worry raised by the MPs on both sides is the brazen refusal by President Mahama to elevate the position of their Leader and Minister for Government Business, Hon Benjamin Kumbuor to a cabinet status; a situation they claimed demonstrates the executive’s disdain for the legislature.

Not even several pleas from the members of the House including minority MPs could cause the President to have a change of mind to restore the cabinet status of the Majority leader as it used to be the norm under President Mahama’s predecessors.

The MPs are said to be feeling affronted by the maltreatment of their leader and therefore are ready to teach the President some lessons.

To prevent the embarrassment and shame that would have greeted the President, leadership of the House swiftly rescheduled the date for the sessional address to Tuesday, February 25, hoping to deal with the concerns before the said date.

Even with the assurance that their concerns would be dealt with before the rescheduled date, the MPs have warned the leadership of Parliament to live by their promise or they continue with their threats.

They have further sent signals not to entertain bills and loan agreement from the president if nothing is done about their plight by next Tuesday.

It would be recalled that prior to the presentation of the 2014 Budget in Parliament, MPs from the majority side threatened to boycott the budget presentation and subsequently make sure the Annual Estimates were not passed. But for a meeting with the President a day before the presentation, they would have carried out their plan.

As at press time yesterday, the leadership of Parliament was locked up in a crunch emergency meeting to deliberate on the issue. All attempts to get out excerpts of the outcome proved futile.