Reject MPs who don’t decline their ex-gratia - CPP Veep candidate

The 2012 Vice Presidential Candidate of the Convention People’s Party (CPP) has asked all eligible voters not to re-elect any Member of Parliament (MP) back into Parliament until they decline the huge ex-gratia paid them at “this crucial time”.

“Do not cast your ballots for any MP until they do what is right,” Nana Akosua Frimponmaa said in a statement issued to XYZ News on Friday.

She has expressed displeasure at the quantum of payments of monies that has been given to former MPs when public sector workers are agitating for salaries.

The 230 MPs who served in the fifth Parliament will collectively paid GHS47m.

Those who lost their seats will each take home GHS311, 000 while those who retained their seats will each get GHS277, 000.

“How can MPs receive this huge amount when teachers are on strike,” she asked.

Doctors, Pharmacists and Judicial Service Workers have also threatened to go on strike.

“Is it not a shame that people who have been voted to represent us and ensure our welfare are only thinking about themselves alone?”

“Let us all wake up from our slumber as Ghanaian voters and demand that the people we have sent to represent us in Parliament do not only go there to enact laws that suit them,” the statement said.

Nana Frimponmaa wondered how come the government found the money to pay the ex-gratia but has not been able to resolve the concerns of the various unions.

She said: “Government has released the money to be paid to former MPs as Ex-Gratia”, but “the same government has refused to pay in full, Salary arrears of University Teachers who are on strike. What kind of unfair and discriminatory circumstance do we find ourselves?”

“Let us all rise up and fight against this discrimination that has been enshrined in the Constitution”.

“Again, until MPs are able to address the concerns in this Country, no one should vote them to represent any Constituency.

“I also want to throw a challenge to all the MPs that if they are really in Parliament for the interest of the people of Ghana then they should offer their ex-gratia as part of what they say is sacrificial to settle the labour unrest which is basically salary arrears owed workers by the government and wait to be paid later,” she proposed.